Documente Academic
Documente Profesional
Documente Cultură
Series Editors
David N. Aspin, Faculty of Education, Monash University, Melbourne, Australia
Judith D. Chapman, Centre for Lifelong Learning, Australian Catholic University,
Melbourne, Australia
Editorial Board
William L. Boyd, Department of Education Policy Studies, Pennsylvania State
University, University Park, PA, USA
Karen Evans, Institute of Education, University of London, UK
Malcolm Skilbeck, Drysdale, Victoria, Australia
Yukiko Sawano, University of the Sacred Heart, Tokyo, Japan
Kaoru Okamoto, National Graduate Institute for Policy Studies, Tokyo, Japan
Denis W. Ralph, Flinders University, Adelaide, Australia
The Lifelong Learning Book Series aims to keep scholars and professionals informed
about and abreast of current developments and to advance research and scholarship
in the domain of Lifelong Learning. It further aims to provide learning and teaching
materials, serve as a forum for scholarly and professional debate and offer a rich fund
of resources for researchers, policy-makers, scholars, professionals and practitioners
in€the field.
Gendered Choices
Learning, Work, Identities in Lifelong
Learning
1 3
Editors
Dr. Sue Jackson Kate Thomas
Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning Schools and Colleges Partnership Service
Birkbeck University of London University of the West of England
26 Russell Square Frenchay Campus, Coldharbour Lane
WC1B 5DQ London, UK BS16 1QD Bristol, UK
s.jackson@bbk.ac.uk kate2.thomas@uwe.ac.uk
This volume is a further production in the Lifelong Learning Book Series pub-
lished by Springer. In previous volumes we have followed a set of agenda for future
research and development, analysis and expansion, strategies and guidelines in the
field. It is still widely accepted that the domain of lifelong learning offers a rich
and fertile ground for setting out and summarising, comparing and criticising the
heterogeneous scope and remit of policies and proposals in its different constitutive
parts. Certainly the scholars, researchers and education policy-makers with whom
we have discussed this matter seem to agree with us that each of the themes to be
found and identified in the Lifelong Learning domain merit a separate volume on its
own – to say nothing of the other possibilities that a more extended analysis of the
field might further generate and develop.
This volume is an outcome of the work of our colleagues Sue Jackson, Irene
Malcolm and Kate Thomas. They examine the impulse towards and agenda of life-
long learning from a feminist point of view and the perspective of “non-traditional
learners”. The authors are concerned to alert their readers to the point that life-
long learning policies, structures and activities can become a forum for “academic”
women in “the academy” to work alongside women participants in the workplace
and in educational institutions and social associations to press forward a feminism
that promotes all women’s interests. Their argument is that feminism has a respon-
sibility to offer useful solutions that take into account the realities of all women,
maintaining coherence between theory and practice.
They lead us in this direction by demonstrating, through concrete examples,
the importance of taking note of the point that many of the choices that are open
to women in developing their desire to engage in lifelong learning activities are
largely silent on the importance of addressing the issues of gender and to that extent
tend to militate against the emancipation which might otherwise be promised and
made available through such activities. The arguments advanced in this volume
are directed towards the end of arguing for and demonstrating how the experiences
expressed in the “voices” of women and non-traditional learners may throw light
upon ways in which all lifelong learners can enjoy equal emancipation and benefit
from their enmeshment with the work and insights of women in the academy in an
interactive, participatory dialogue, where both can undertake and achieve a deep
v
vi Editorial by Series Editors
educational emancipation. The present work presents arguments to show why and
how this might be brought about; it does so by concentrating on and distilling les-
sons from the experiences of individuals with such emancipatory interests, working
together in dialogic interchange in ways that can function to promote and expand
resistance to the hegemony claimed by many of such writers to be found in most
current policies of lifelong learning, particularly in its globalised form.
Gendered Choices: Learning, Work and Identities in Lifelong Learning brings
together insights and narratives of a group of women scholars, who address issues
of feminism and social inclusion within the framework of adult education and learn-
ing throughout life. The authors discuss the experiences and insights of feminists in
adult education, among them them many non-academic women, who, they argue,
have been historically silenced from the feminist mainstream discourse and are now
claiming their voice. The work is particularly concerned to emphasize the following:
• That the field of gender studies is currently under-represented in lifelong learn-
ing literature
• The role of gender as a shaper of participation in and experience of lifelong
learning
• The importance of gendered choices across the lifespan and personal and profes-
sional identities
• The need for gender(ed) perspectives on work-based/work-related learning and
the labour market
• The importance of developing international comparisons and the significance of
globalisation in the text.
This volume assumes the standpoint of feminist epistemology and ontology and
seeks to provide a rigorous theoretical analysis of feminist thought and real wom-
en’s lives. It seeks to draw a connection between the lack of gendered choices
and marginalised women’s workplace location, social participation, dialogically
oriented adult education and solidarity. These the authors see as key elements in
the creation of personal meaning and social transformation in situations in which
their workplace and life choices can be given value and significance. Grounded
in a dialogic educational perspective, the authors’ insightful work and the voices
of the women with whom they have worked is based upon the realisation that the
“personal is the political” and that praxis will serve to call into question and resist
many of the ‘taken-for-granted’ assumptions with which globalised lifelong learn-
ing policies, practices and institutions have been hitherto normalised. The style,
tenor and purpose of the arguments contained and set out in it this volume make
for a unique, engaging, accessible reading experience. This book will prove to be
of great value to professors, researchers, graduate students, teachers and teacher
trainers with a strong interest in Adult Education, Lifelong Learning and Gender
Studies. Above all it is a work that should be defined as required reading for all
those engaged in promoting and providing lifelong learning activities in workplace,
home and society.
Sue, Irene and Kate have done all of us a signal service in their writing of this
book. They have shown us the experiences and contributions of women making
Editorial by Series Editors vii
choices and decisions about the valued elements in their lives and how these may
contribute to de- and re-constructing educational and social practices and theories.
These, and the policies emanating from them, should in future embody lessons
arising from and validated through women’s experiences of learning, working and
developing a sense of identity in all aspects of learning throughout and across the
lifespan. Their work shows how women may in future make better and more in-
formed decisions on the pathways and explorations of their own future learning by
articulating their own voices for themselves and pursuing their own interests and
needs for growth. These authors tell us that it is vital to listen to women’s voices in
explaining and exploring their problems of choice; for they have much to teach us.
It also shows us how institutions must take the interests of such learners se-
riously and seek to open up and ameliorate their learning options offered to all
learners indifferently in all the structures and lifelong learning activities they pro-
vide by incorporating their own contributions of thought and language into more
traditional approaches and, by effective dialogue and learning activities, seeking
to change both for the better. Finally their analysis locates all these arguments and
explorations in a thoroughly informed, complex and sophisticated set of theoretical
considerations bearing upon, underpinning and implicitly or explicitly shaping all
such initiatives and undertakings. This is where the experience of the authors, their
gifts and abilities with interests and concerns of the “non-formal” students with
whom they conducted their research are so fruitful for and helpful to the counter-
hegemonic and wider emancipatory agenda of lifelong learning.
We are pleased and excited that this highly important work helps carry forward
the agenda of the Springer Series on Lifelong Learning. We trust that its readers
will find it as stimulating, thought-provoking and controversial as we have found it
and we commend it with great confidence to all those working in this field. We are
sure that this further volume in the Springer Series will provide the wide range of
constituencies working in the domain of lifelong learning with a rich range of new
material for their consideration and further investigation. We believe that it will en-
courage their continuing critical thinking, research and development, academic and
scholarly production and individual, institutional and professional progress.
1╅Introduction����������������������������������尓������������������������������������尓���������������������������� ╅ 1
Sue Jackson, Irene Malcolm and Kate Thomas
ix
x Contents
20â•…Policy Challenges: New Spaces for Women’s Lifelong Learning�������� ╇ 245
Irene Malcolm, Sue Jackson and Kate Thomas
Prof. Sue Jackson╇ Sue left school at 15, and began her educational journey
with an ‘A’ level at her local further education college, soon after the birth of
her first child. With the birth of her second child, she made the step into higher
education as a mature student with the Open University, and went on to take a
master’s in women’s studies, and then a PhD in women and education. She be-
gan her academic career teaching ‘fresh start’, access and new opportunities for
women courses at adult education centres and further education colleges before
developing her career in higher education. Sue has been working at Birkbeck,
University of London, since 2001, when she was appointed to a lectureship. She
is now professor of lifelong learning and gender, pro-vice-master for learning
and teaching, and director of Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning. She has
been a convenor of the Women in Lifelong Learning Network of the Universities
Association for Lifelong Learning (UALL). This publication is therefore born
out of Sue’s personal as well as her professional experiences.
Dr. Irene Malcolm╇ Irene is a lecturer in education at the University of Dundee
where she teaches on the masters programme in applied professional studies and
undertakes doctoral supervision. She has spent her career teaching in post-compul-
sory education, in further education and in higher education. She has also worked
as a field researcher on a research project funded by the Economic and Social Re-
search Council (ESRC) which studied the learning biographies of adults. Through
this project and through her doctoral studies of women in the new economy she
developed her interest in women’s learning at home and in work.
Kate Thomas╇ Kate worked in book publishing and broadcasting before finding
her way into higher education through temporary work. She moved from organis-
ing other people’s courses at the University of Manchester, to become programme
manager of a European Science Foundation (ESF) project at the University of
Bristol, training adults to become support workers for disabled people. During
this period she gained a postgraduate certificate in teaching in lifelong learning
from Birkbeck, University of London. For the past four years she has been based
at the University of the West of England as a Progression co-ordinator for the
xi
xii About the Editors
Penny Burke╇ Penny’s first career was as a classical ballet dancer. After the birth
of her first son, she longed for intellectual engagement and discovered an access to
higher education course. Penny went on to study sociology and developed a pas-
sionate commitment to women’s access to higher education. She explored issues
of women’s access further through an MA in women’s studies, and then went on to
gain her PhD in 2001. Penny started a lectureship at the Institute of Education in
2002, just after the publication of her first book Accessing Education: Effectively
Widening Participation. Her interest in masculinity and educational participation
grew out of her experiences of mothering three sons and wanting to talk back to dis-
courses that oversimplified gender and access to higher education. In 2008, Penny
received the Higher Education Academy’s prestigious National Teaching Fellow-
ship Award. She is the Access and Widening Participation Network Leader for the
Society for Research in Higher Education. Penny is now professor of education at
Roehampton University.
Carrie Cable╇ Carrie began her teaching career in Nigeria in 1974 and then taught
in London schools in the 1980s and 1990s. Her specialist field is English as an ad-
ditional language (EAL) and she led a team of peripatetic teachers and bilingual
assistants and was involved in advisory work before deciding on a career change
in 1998. She is now a senior lecturer in education at the Open University involved
in developing courses for teachers, teaching assistants and early years practitioners
and researching the impact of study on practice. She has contributed to national
training and development initiatives in the field of EAL and has authored and edited
papers and books on EAL, bilingual practitioners, supporting children’s learning
and professionalism. She is currently director of a research project funded by the
Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) examining the learning and
teaching of languages in primary schools.
Leona M. English╇ Leona is a professor of adult education and chair of the Depart-
ment of Adult Education at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Sco-
tia, Canada. She pursued a traditional route through higher education, going straight
from high school to earn a BA and BEd from Memorial University. Having taught
high school, she earned a master’s degree from the University of Toronto. This was
xiii
xiv About the Authors
followed by an EdD from Columbia University, NYC, after she spent several years
in curriculum and professional development work. Leona is past president of the
Canadian Association for the Study of Adult Education and editor of the Interna-
tional Encyclopedia of Adult Education. Her main research area is gender and learn-
ing especially with women in the nonprofit sector. Her website on gender is located
at www.stfx.ca/people/lenglish.
Jan Etienne╇ Jan Etienne is a graduate of the School for Policy Studies, University
of Bristol and teaches Sociology in the School of Social Sciences, History and Phi-
losophy at Birkbeck, University of London. She is co-author of ‘Beyond the home:
informal learning and community practice for older women’ and has a particular in-
terest in lifelong learning and first generation African Caribbean women. She is the
2008 recipient of the Michael Stephens Award for her research into women learning
later and is a former local elected member in the London Borough of Brent. She
stood for Parliament in the 2005 UK General Election.
Rosalind Foskett╇ Ros Foskett started her career teaching geography in schools and
further education followed by a period of self-employment as a curriculum consul-
tant. She has worked in higher education (HE) since 1990, firstly in a college of HE
(variously as lecturer, programme manager and dean), and then at the University
of Southampton where she held several senior roles including associate dean for
enterprise and innovation in the Faculty of Law, Arts and Social Sciences. She is
currently deputy vice chancellor and professor of HE at the University of Worces-
ter. Her teaching specialism is in post-compulsory education and training. She has
also been involved in a number of research projects at Southampton and Worcester.
These have included participation in higher education, partnerships between uni-
versities and business, career and education decision-making, and leadership and
management capacity building in African universities.
Alison Fuller╇ Prior to joining the School of Education at the University of South-
ampton in 2004, Alison Fuller held research and academic posts at the Universities
of Lancaster and Leicester. Alison is now head of the Lifelong and Work-Related
Learning Research Centre at Southampton. Her main research and publishing in-
terests are in the fields of education—work transitions; vocational education and
apprenticeship; workplace learning; lifelong learning and changing patterns of adult
participation in education. Alison’s most recent book (co-authored with Alan Fel-
stead, Lorna Unwin and Nick Jewson), Improving Working as Learning, was pub-
lished by Routledge in 2009.
Gill Goodliff╇ Gill originally qualified as a residential social worker and until the
birth of her first child, worked in family centres in London run by the National Chil-
dren’s Home. She began teaching adults—parents and childminders—in communi-
ty-based education in inner London Boroughs, and when her youngest child started
school in 1990, she returned to study at the University of London, Institute of Edu-
cation. Whilst working as a lecturer in early years in a college of further education
in Hertfordshire, she completed her master’s in education. Gill has been working at
the Open University since 2004 developing courses for early years practitioners and
About the Authors xv
re-searching the impact of study on practice and professional identity. She is now a
senior lecturer and head of Awards for Early Years and completing doctoral studies
exploring young children’s spirituality.
Clem Herman╇ Clem Herman is a senior lecturer in the Department of Communi-
cation and Systems at the Open University in the UK. She has worked for over 25
years as an educator, practi-tioner and researcher to support women in ICT and oth-
er science, engineering and technology sectors. Before joining the Open University,
she was the director of the Women’s Electronic Village Hall (WEVH) in Manches-
ter pioneering the use of ICTs to empower women and as a tool to combat social
exclusion. Clem is currently running an award-winning online course for women
returners and her most recent research has been about the impact of career breaks
for women in European science, engineering and technology (SET) companies.
Barbara Hodgson╇ Barbara is senior lecturer in ducational technology at the Open
University (OU) with a particular interest in teaching and learning in distance high-
er education. She currently directs the postgraduate teaching programme in online
and distance education, and works with colleagues on the development of their
practice through a postgraduate certificate in academic practice. She has worked
on the development of a wide range of science, science education, women’s studies
and educational technology courses at the OU. Throughout her career she has had a
research and implementation/intervention interest in gender and science at all levels
of education. Most recently her research has been concerned with women’s careers
in science, engineering and technology (SET) and, as a partner in the UK Resource
Centre for Women in SET, she has been working to help women return after career
breaks.
Suzanne Hyde╇ Suzanne began her paid working life as a youth worker before
moving into adult and community education, and has now spent over 20 years
working across the community and voluntary sector, adult education, further and
higher education sectors. She currently works between the universities of Brighton
and Sussex as a lecturer and researcher. Areas of interest include narrative and life
history approaches and participatory action research methodologies. The focus of
her research has included workplace learning and employer engagement, widening
participation into higher education, mature student experience and issues affecting
young people labelled as NEET (not in employment, education or training).
Brenda Johnston╇ Brenda Johnston is a senior research fellow in the School of
Education at the University of Southampton. Her particular areas of interest and
expertise lie in the fields of higher education pedagogy, especially criticality, aca-
demic writing and assessment. She is also interested in issues of widening participa-
tion and graduate employment.
Gill Kirkup╇ Dr. Gill Kirkup is a senior lecturer in educational technology at the
Institute of Educational Technology, Open University, UK. Between 2008 and 2011
she is seconded part-time as head of research, data and policy to the UK Resources
Centre for Women in Science Engineering. She is a fellow of the Higher Educa-
xvi About the Authors
tion Academy and a member of the Association of Learning Technologies and the
Fawcett Society. She would classify herself as a feminist educator and researcher.
Her main research interests lie in the complex relationship between gender and
technology, and learning technologies in particular, and she has published widely
in these areas.
Narjes Mehdizadeh╇ Narjes developed her interest in higher education and lifelong
learning through her involvement in a research project in the Centre for Research
in Lifelong Learning (CRLL) in the Glasgow Caledonian University as well as her
master’s and doctoral studies. Her current area of research interest is an exploration
of the significance of welfare for women’s experience of citizenship and the impact
of contested values in one area of welfare—childcare—in Iran. Publications include
journal articles about adjustment problems of international students as well as rec-
onciliation of work and family in the international journals, in addition to a number
of conference papers in the UK. She is currently a member of the research team in
the research project of the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) entitled
‘Social Policy and Religion in the Middle East: Beyond the Rentier State, Toward
a New Ethic of Welfare’.
Linda Miller╇ Dr. Linda Miller is a senior research fellow at the Institute for Em-
ployment Studies. She undertook two of the studies that contributed to the gen-
eral formal investigation of the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) into oc-
cupational gender segregation and she has examined factors affecting women’s and
men’s choice of vocational and academic qualifications and careers, in particular
focusing on the factors that affect women’s decisions to enter science, engineering
and technology (SET). In 2007–2008 she was an advisor to the EU project analys-
ing the impact of national policies on the entry of women into SET, and in 2002
contributed to Baroness Greenfield’s review of women in SET. Her more recent
work has examined the position of women in London’s economy and the role of
coaching in helping women move into board-level positions.
Ursula Murray╇ Ursula Murray joined Birkbeck just over 10 years ago. She tutors
courses on public sector management and local government, voluntary sector stud-
ies, gender and management, and lifelong learning. Previously she has worked in
both the voluntary sector undertaking action research projects around local eco-
nomic change and women’s employment and subsequently as a senior manager in
local government co-ordinating policy and commissioning roles. She has an MSc in
group relations, organisations and society from the University of the West of Eng-
land (UWE), Bristol (2001) and completed her PhD at the Complexity and Man-
agement Centre, University of Hertfordshire Business School in 2006. Her research
using narrative and psychosocial methodologies explored the meaning of the public
sector and a public service ethos in the context of current restructuring and change.
Esther Oliver╇ Esther is ‘Ramon y Cajal’ Researcher at the Department of Socio-
logical Theory, University of Barcelona where she completed her doctorate in soci-
ology in 2003. From 2006 to 2008 she was a postdoctoral fellow (visiting academic)
About the Authors xvii
at the University of Warwick in the UK. Esther’s research interests are focused
on gender issues and social and educational inequalities. She is member of CREA
(Centre of Research on Social and Educational Inequalities) research centre at the
University of Barcelona where she is now the main researcher of the RTD (Re-
search and Technology Development) project: ‘The Mirage of Upward Social Mo-
bility and the Socialization of Gender Violence’ funded by the Spanish Ministry of
Science. Esther’s work is published in international journals, and she has recently
completed another work in English language: ‘Opening Schools to All Women: Ef-
forts to Overcome Gender Violence in Spain’, published in the British Journal of
Sociology of Education (E. Oliver, M. Soler & R. Flecha, 2009).
Karen Paton╇ Karen Paton was the research associate on the project: ‘Non-particiÂ�
pation in Higher Education: Decision-Making as an Embedded Social Practice’,
funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), conducted at the
University of Southampton. Prior to working at Southampton, she was a researcher
at the University of Bristol.
Gill Scott╇ Gill Scott is emeritus professor of social policy at Glasgow Caledo-
nian University. She was director of the University’s Scottish Poverty Information
Unit, a policy and research unit, for 10 years before retiring in 2007. She acted as
external adviser in 2003–2006 to the development of the anti-poverty strategy of
the Scottish Government’s Cabinet and to the UK Parliament’s Work and Pensions
Committee Inquiry on Child Poverty 2007–2008. She is currently specialist expert
on women, enterprise and economic development to the European Commission’s
URBACT programme. Relevant publications include Exploring Social Policy in
Scotland (co-editor, 2004, Policy Press), Women in Local Partnerships (2000, Scot-
tish Executive) and ‘Gender, Poverty and Wealth’ in T. Ridge and S. Wright (eds.)
Understanding Inequality, Poverty and Wealth (2008, Policy Press).
Anita Walsh╇ Anita is a senior lecturer in work-based learning and an expert in de-
signing academic programmes which are based on people’s professional activities
in the workplace. She took her first degree as a mature student when her younger
daughter started school, and her studies in the social sciences awakened her interest
in gender. Her subsequent PhD focused on the British Women’s Liberation Move-
ment and the politics of experience. Anita has been interested in the relationship be-
tween experience and learning since the early 1990s, and her current work considers
experiential learning outside the university. She defines herself as a practitioner-
researcher and draws on her life and work experience to inform both her practice
and her research. Anita’s longstanding interest in gender has been integrated with
her active interest in the role of experience in both learning and the development of
professional expertise.
Elizabeth Whitelegg╇ Elizabeth Whitelegg is a senior lecturer at the Open Univer-
sity. She is an experienced researcher in science education and science communi-
cation and was co-principle investigator on the Invisible Witnesses project (www.
open.ac.uk/invisible-witnesses) which examined gendered representation of girls
xviii About the Authors
This book is about choices: the choices we are able to make, whether or not in
situations of our own choosing, and the choices we are not. It is about the gen-
dered choices that affect our engagement with lifelong learning, including learning
at work, and what that means for our identities. It has become difficult to write
about ‘choice’ in recent times, with discussions of individual choice located in the
neo-liberal discourses of market forces. The current language of policy is based
within an individualised notion of personal choice, which is constructed as rational
and equally available to all. However, whilst ‘choice’ has been a mantra in edu-
cation policy, the issue of the gendering of choice has been relatively neglected,
although ‘choices’ continue to be gendered (and classed, racialised and sexualised).
Nevertheless, discussions of apparently neutral and rational choices have become
embedded in discourses, ideologies and policy developments of lifelong learning.
This book aims to deconstruct such discussions and develop a different world view.
The book reflects a variety of approaches to gender sensitive research in a range of
contexts. It captures the voices of women as authors, researchers and practitioners
as well as subjects in the contemporary field of lifelong learning.
The late twentieth/early twenty-first century has been heralded as a new age
in lifelong learning. Lifelong learning policies have risen to prominence in recent
years, and are high on the educational, economic and social agendas of many gov-
ernments (including in Europe, Japan and other Asian countries, North America and
Australia) as well as of international organisations such as the OECD, UNESCO
S. Jackson ()
Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning, Birkbeck University of London,
26 Russell Square, WC1B 5DQ London, UK
e-mail: s.jackson@bbk.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 1
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_1, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
2 S. Jackson et al.
learning but also work-based learning, which is central to current policy regarding
lifelong learning. In addition, for women the public/private spaces of work and home
are often conflated, an issue frequently ignored in texts exploring lifelong and work-
based learning. This book explores some of these critical issues through the multiple
and fractured identities which constitute gendered lives. It brings together key aspects
of adult learning from a gender perspective, including widening participation, work-
place learning and informal pathways. It goes beyond conventional settings for adult
learning to consider the way learning is gendered in the workplace and in voluntary
and community sector organisations. Adult learning sits within a shifting landscape
of educational policy which is cross-cut by the skills agenda, funding policies, new
qualifications and the widening participation debate. Gender is central to these de-
velopments and shapes participation in and experiences of lifelong learning.
The book addresses issues of gender within in the growing skills-based approach
to lifelong learning, career decisions, professional identities and informal networks.
In this introductory chapter we focus on some of the key themes, returning to others
in the concluding chapter: the themes, although presented separately should be read
not as discrete sub-sections but rather as indications of some of the complexities of
the issues and debates which inter/weave their way through the book.
Neo-liberalism
At the level of macro analysis, a significant theme throughout the book is the inter-
action of lifelong learning policies with broader policy discourses, including those
informed by neo-liberalism. Critique of such discourses and a consideration of miti-
gating measures are essential, not just to address limitations placed on women, but
to overcome false gender divisions that affect identity possibilities for women and
men. While the chapters reflect diverse learning cultures, they also reveal the ways
in which learning experiences are embedded in, and interact with broader political,
economic and social circumstances. The present volume brings fresh insights to
issues of gender and lifelong learning by positioning neo-liberalism in a way that
shows it to be complex and differentiated. For example, in Chap.€4 we see how the
interviewees’ discourses of aspiration draw on neo-liberal notions, such as respon-
sibility for one’s own learning. However, the research is set in a multicultural con-
text, where neo-liberal ideas interact with cultural influences from countries such as
Pakistan and Iraq in the experiences described by the interviewees.
Part of the paradox of neo-liberalism is that it presents itself as a non-political
and common sense world view, and part of its ideology is to convince us that it
is not ideological (Eagleton 1991). In the light of this influence there is a danger
that critiques are narrowed as some educationalists confine themselves to discus-
sions from a western-dominated perspective. Recent feminist analyses in the field
of gender and education have begun to critique the western and Anglophone domi-
nation of academic discourses, highlighting “a preoccupation with Western femi-
nist concerns and a relative lack of interest in other parts of the world” (Öhrn and
4 S. Jackson et al.
Weiner 2009, p.€427). By bringing together, in the present volume, research related
to women’s gendered experiences in countries beyond Anglophone regions we seek
to move away from a purely western-dominated response to neo-liberalism as it
relates to gendered choices in lifelong learning.
In some cases, neo-liberalism interacts with political philosophies and religions
which predominate outside the west. This is highlighted in the present volume
where, for example, the interaction of western, neo-liberal policies with local Ira-
nian cultures and values are analysed (see Chap.€12). The coexistence of political,
economic and religious ideologies influences the way these manifest themselves in
women’s lives (Barrett 1997). Women’s learning and the position of women, both
in industrialised and in less-industrialised countries, are issues that appear caught
in the confluence of such philosophies, restricting choices of learning and career
pathways. It seems that the constraints placed on women have made such gendered
positions a barometer for the social values that prevail: in many countries these
values reflect the policy imperatives of neo-liberalism and the marketisation of all
areas of life (Burman 2006).
Globalisation
its drive of competition and its links with the skills agenda has been to reinforce
women’s low-paid status.
This book is about gendered choices in lifelong learning, and the ways in which
power and resistances are played out through the choices that are (able to be)
made. Resistances take place in different places and in different contexts, includ-
ing in the learning pathways with which we engage (see Part€ I of this book);
in the workplace (Part II) and through identities that are constructed and de/re/
constructed (Part III). Resistances are counter-hegemonic practices that challenge
or subvert hegemonic ways of being and knowing, and are attached to deeply
embedded structural inequalities (Burke and Jackson 2007). They can occur at
an emotional level, and/or within the micro levels of everyday experiences, and
through engagement with policy. We demonstrate ways in which policy can be
resisted through, for example, new pedagogies of transformation which make re-
sistance possible.
Chapter authors argue for the importance of feminist or woman-centred networks
in order to resist hegemonic ways of being and to discover new ways of knowing, so
opening up possibilities for choice. At times, this seems like an impossible task. For
example, in her consideration of ways in which women’s choices can be shattered
through violence on campuses (or of course anywhere else), Esther Oliver calls for
changes in attitudes and values as well as in behaviours and policies. However, she
also shows how solidarity amongst women can lead to attempts to repair the shat-
tered choices she described. Other authors emphasise the importance of feminist
networks to support women’s choices in male-dominated areas. They argue that
innovative approaches to learning that have their roots in feminist principles and
pedagogies can support women to resist gendered identity constructions while en-
gaging with learning and work.
The book aims to highlight ways in which ‘knowledge’ about learning, learners and
‘choice’ are framed within gendered and classed hegemonic discourses, outlining
ways in which new knowledges, and new ways of knowing can be created. Burke
and Jackson (2007, p.€27) argue that there are
particular ways of thinking about lifelong learning that have gained hegemony and these
have a profound effect on the policy and practice of lifelong learning and yet these are
largely uninformed by the complex, contradictory and multifaceted experiences of learning.
This is largely due to the processes and politics of knowledge validation and the ways that
these operate around shifting and complex inequalities.
1â•… Introduction 7
Some knowledges and ways of knowing are privileged, whilst others are margin-
alised or even made invisible. For example, Suzanne Hyde (Chap.€10) shows that
a word search of the Leitch report on skills in the UK (HM Treasury 2006) reveals
that gender is mentioned only once. As Foucault (1974) demonstrated, knowledge
is always related to power: indeed he chose to refer to power/knowledge to indi-
cate the impossibility of separation. However, power can be resisted and feminist
approaches enable gender to be explored through relational perspectives, bringing
different, and valued, ways of knowing. We argue that this can mitigate against
the assumption that valid knowledge is only created in the academy by those with
the power and influence to do so. Nevertheless, normative expectations sometimes
make new knowledges difficult to come into being. One way in which new ways of
knowing can be developed is through reflection in action which can enable us to de-
velop and value the knowledges that have been developed at a range of sites where
women live and work, and that can be applied to new understandings of learning
work and identity.
The development of new knowledges remains central to this book, with chapter
authors drawing on feminist epistemology in a range of theoretical and method-
ological approaches that emerge at different sites, from universities to community
learning in three different continents. The range of methodologies that underpins
the discussion is considerable and reflects the complexity and sophistication of
feminist scholarship. The chapters draw on postmodern feminism and complexity
science; discourse analysis; action research; life history; policy research and Fou-
cauldian feminism. Conceptual and methodological innovation is reflected in many
of the chapters. In this way, the volume expresses the diversity of feminism(s) and
the range of possibilities offered by feminist epistemology.
The book is organised in three sections. The first section examines gendered learn-
ing pathways, discussing the interaction between learning and gendered choices,
and examining how policies and current methodological approaches frame both
women’s and men’s learning. The second section is concerned with setting an agen-
da for gender in work-based learning, exploring gendered choices at different stages
of the employment cycle and in different employment and learning contexts. Like
the other sections in this book, section two has an interest in the interaction of policy
and experience and the way these interactions are crosscut by gender, class and race.
The final section of the book explores gendered identities, considering the ways
in which our gendered identities impact onto ‘choice’, which itself is gendered.
This publication arises from a conference hosted jointly by the Women in Lifelong
Learning Network of the Universities’ Association for Lifelong Learning in the UK,
and the Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning (University of London), which at-
tracted contributions from practitioners, policy makers and academics. This result-
ing collection therefore represents a broad range of perspectives on adult learning
8 S. Jackson et al.
in practice, in the early twenty-first century. The contributors to the publication are
adult learning practitioners and academics who share a commitment to adult learn-
ing and an interest in exploring the ways in which gender informs their practice,
wider policies and the experiences of individual learners. A range of theoretical
perspectives is represented within this collection, grounded in empirical research
and practice.
The collection is entirely authored by women and advances feminist understand-
ings of lifelong learning, with the authors placing the social construction of gender
and women’s experiences (intersected with ‘race’, social class and age) at the centre
of their work. In her consideration of Gendered Education, Sandra Acker considers
six core assumptions in feminist research, one of which is to show that the personal
is political (Acker 1994). In addition, feminist research, she says, aims to show an
awareness of women’s injustices; to improve women’s lives; to highlight the cen-
trality of women; to replace existing knowledges; and to consider the position of
the researcher and the researched. In their different ways, the authors of the chapters
in this book cumulatively fulfil all these aims, making this a feminist engagement
with choice and lifelong learning. Perhaps one of the most central components of
a feminist methodology is the engagement with research as praxis, bringing about
change in women’s lives. Feminist research can be a radical and liberatory force for
both researched and researcher (see, e.g. Jackson 2004), and the calls for change in
developing a different worldview about gender, choice and lifelong learning is ap-
parent throughout the book.
This book is written at a transitional moment in women’s lives, represented by
the first decade of the twenty-first century, through an international context that
embraces perspectives from the UK, continental Europe, Canada and Iran, extend-
ing knowledge, understandings and critiques of gendered choices (and constraints)
within lifelong learning. The book addresses the complexities of gender issues
which are in danger of becoming obscured in contemporary widening participation
and lifelong learning debates.
References
Aaron, J., & Walby, S. (Eds.). (1991). Out of the margins: Women’s studies in the nineties. London:
Falmer.
Acker, S. (1994). Gendered education. Bucks: Oxford University Press.
Australian National Training Authority. (1998). A bridge to the future: Australia’s national strat-
egy for occupational education and training 1998–2003. Brisbane: ANTA.
Barrett, M. (1997). Capitalism and women’s liberation. In L. Nicholson (Ed.), The second wave
reader: A reader in feminism (pp. 123–130). London: Routledge.
Billett, S., Fenwick, T., & Somerville, M. (2006). Work, subjectivity and learning. Understanding
learning through working life. Dordrecht: Springer.
Burke, P., & Jackson, S. (2007). Reconceptualising lifelong learning: Feminist interventions. Lon-
don: Routledge.
Burman, E. (2006). Emotions and reflexivity in feminised education action research. Educational
Action Research, 14, 315–332.
1â•… Introduction 9
The chapters in this section of the book deal with gendered choices in learning.
While this is the principal focus, gendered learning is interwoven with the other two
themes of the volume, as learning experiences affect work and identities. Drawing
on critical analyses of the field, the authors discuss the interaction of learning and
gendered pathways, examining how policies and pedagogies frame both women’s
and men’s learning. The chapters investigate lifelong learning at various sites, in-
cluding in the virtual environment. While the data on which the authors draw reflect
the diversity of UK society in the 21st century, discussions and analyses are of
significance beyond the UK, reinforcing the book’s international relevance. This is
further supported, for example, with an account of research that is based on a conti-
nental European study (see Chap.€6). All of the chapters in this section draw on em-
pirical research into learning experiences: Chaps.€4, 5 and 6 are based on sizeable
research projects with research council, institutional and government funding, and
Chap.€3 is a vivid and detailed analysis of learning in the author’s own classroom.
The authors include teachers as well as academics; they highlight the problems of
gendered choices and advocate ways of overcoming them in lifelong learning.
The writers analyse the ways that current policies enhance or restrict learning,
casting doubt on some policies that claim to extend equal opportunities (Thomas
2001). The notion of widening participation that is at the heart of neo-liberal think-
ing emphasises everyone’s rights to access (Leathwood and Francis 2006). Yet, as
all of the authors in this section show, complexity and disjuncture surround such
policies in lifelong learning. In promoting the rights of individuals as more sig-
nificant than valuing shared experience, neo-liberal economics and related educa-
tion policies affect learning pathways by stimulating competition, not just among
nations in globalised markets (Brine 2006), but also among the individuals and
institutions in these markets. The analyses in the chapters that follow illustrate how
pathways that emerge from such policies are both gendered and classed, as they de-
rive from imperatives that promote the survival of the fittest (Davies and Saltmarsh
I. Malcolm ()
School of Education, Social Work and Community Education, University of Dundee,
Nethergate, Dundee, DD1 4HN, UK
e-mail: i.z.malcolm@dundee.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 13
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_2, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
14 I. Malcolm et al.
2007). Sometimes this has the effect of reinforcing existing hierarchies (Chap.€6):
At other times, the constraining influence of neo-liberal policies appears to be in
tension with contradictory discourses of enablement (Chap.€4).
An important feature of present lifelong learning policies examined in the fol-
lowing chapters is the skills-based approach. Curricula that promote skills and mea-
surable outputs as the prime goals of learning are widespread among western coun-
tries and have their roots in the introduction of marketisation in education (Apple
2006). In the discussions that follow, the authors subject this approach to critical
scrutiny, demonstrating how the over-concentration on measurable outputs detracts
from broader aims and diverts attention from pathways that promote social and rela-
tional learning. In the first two chapters, both Ursula Murray and Penny Jane Burke
draw attention to the inadequacies of approaches to lifelong learning that fail to
take account of complex learning processes to engage situated and embodied learn-
ers (Boler 1999). Developing this argument further in Chap.€5, Clem Herman and
her colleagues discuss the evaluation of a learning programme that offers a broad
developmental base, linked to shared experience and peer support. In this chapter,
as in the final chapter of the section by Esther Olivier, learning is conceptualised in
relation to critical engagements that draw on life experiences which are shared as
well as individual (Merrill 2007). In this way the authors offer an alternative vision
to neo-liberal domination of the lifelong learning agenda.
In Chap.€3 Ursula Murray introduces the theme of gendered learning pathways
by drawing on qualitative research from her own teaching. She explores the ben-
efits that derive from attention to the learners’ own experience. Against current
policies and practices, Murray discusses the advantages of a relational model of
learning which she reasserts as a counterbalance to an over-concentration on skills.
Murray begins the chapter with a detailed overview of neo-liberal policy in UK
public services. She discusses instances where academics and educational institu-
tions are enlisted as market players (Davies 2003), compromising critical distance
to the detriment of educational provider and learner. Drawing on ethnographic data
from a reflective journal, Murray uses narrative analysis that is nuanced through
psychosocial understanding and complexity science (Stacey and Griffin 2005). In
data excerpts from her engagement with three groups of learners, including some
who are studying for employer-sponsored Foundation degrees, Murray explores the
importance of taking learners’ experience seriously and bringing this into dialogue
with theory. The author points to some of the problems entailed when learning path-
ways are dominated by curriculum outcomes that are driven by short-term econom-
ic goals: In response to this Murray discusses the benefits that can be gained from a
critical and reflexive focus on learning processes.
In Chap.€4, Penny Jane Burke develops further the theme of gendered learning
pathways. She examines widening participation frameworks in education policy
through a study of learning, aspirations and complex identifications (Hall 1992).
Her analyses add to the themes initiated in the previous chapter as she highlights the
implications of marketisation for learning choices. Using data from an ESRC (UK
Economic and Social Research Council) funded study of learning identities and
masculinities, Burke examines gendered influences on goals and decision-making
2â•… Part I: Introduction 15
among men who are accessing higher education. Her research is based on language
analysis, drawing on data from her engagement with policy discourses and with
the discursive repertoires of interviewees. Like Murray, Burke contextualises her
analysis in a critique of policies that affect lifelong learning in the UK and which
are replicated, or have parallels further afield (Allen et€ al. 2005). Burke locates
the needs of the economy and the market as strong imperatives in many lifelong
learning policies. The complexity of neo-liberalism’s impact on lifelong learning is
captured in Burke’s account of the paradoxes in policy discourses where transfor-
mation and social justice are linked to competition. At the same time, her critique
underlines the problems entailed when learning that seeks to embrace social justice
is aligned with technologies of self-improvement.
Burke finds that gendered identities exert a strong influence in shaping the learn-
ing experiences and subsequent ambitions of the men in her sample. Rather than
focussing only on individual perspectives in decision-making and the formulation
of aspirations, Burke draws on sociological insights to illuminate relational and
contextual dimensions of learning. In her analysis, the aspirations of lifelong learn-
ers emerge as complex and nuanced, produced through gendered identifications and
intricate social negotiations.
While the first two chapters in this part of the book deal with the policy influ-
ences of neo-liberalism, the writing of Herman, Hodgson, Kirkup and Whitelegg in
Chap.€5 and Olivier in the final chapter, deal with broad cultural factors that affect
women’s choices and their lifelong learning (Colley 2006). Chapter€5 furthers the
critique of gendered learning choices by describing a possible route through these in
a learning programme designed for women. The findings in this chapter draw on the
analyses of data from the authors’ action research based in the UK. In an example
from teaching and curriculum development, practitioners address the constraining
influence of existing power hierarchies in SET (Science Engineering and Technol-
ogy). They consider the rationale for and the impact of a programme of generic, per-
sonal and professional development that offers a broad range of support to women
wishing to take up SET careers after career breaks. As the authors explain, women
are underrepresented in SET, not just in the UK (Faulkner 2007), but across many
countries on an international scale (Faulkner 2004).
On the basis of a critical review of the policy background of SET in the UK (Mur-
phy and Whitelegg 2006), the authors highlight the benefits of certain initiatives,
while drawing attention to the detrimental effect of short-term funding. The authors
describe the crucial role played by a collection of women academics and activists at
one institution who were able to draw on interdisciplinary strengths to access UK
and EU funding. They emphasise the innovative nature of the resulting programme,
where women’s networking is central to its pedagogy, design and outcomes. The
prominence given to reflective activities that draw on the learners’ experience links
the pedagogies described in this chapter to those discussed by Murray and Burke.
Despite the achievements of the programme they describe, Herman and col-
leagues identify continued challenges presented by structural and institutional
factors that militate against women pursuing careers in SET. In addition, the au-
thors identify a prevalent male culture in SET workplaces that makes it difficult
16 I. Malcolm et al.
for women with appropriate qualifications to develop their careers. In the light of
the international dimension of women’s underrepresentation, the authors conclude
with a series of recommendations that are relevant to HE institutions in a number of
countries. The theme of addressing constraints on women’s learning and participa-
tion is continued in the final chapter of this part of the book.
In Chap.€6, Esther Olivier gives an account of her research into gender violence
as a barrier to women’s full participation in the academy. The author challenges
the stereotypical notion that only certain women are affected by gender violence,
while emphasising the scale and international character of this hidden problem in
universities. Olivier draws on a review of international literature as well as on her
own research data to analyse how the phenomenon crosses boundaries and affects
women’s learning and careers (Osborne 1995). Her study data are taken from in-
terviews conducted with representatives at a number of universities, in addition to
daily life stories elicited from feminist and student organisations. Using a qualitative
methodology, Olivier obtains an institutional view that complements the individual
perspectives captured in her data from interviews with those who deal directly with
the impact of gender violence. While Olivier’s data gathering is conducted at UK
universities, her research originates in Catalunya and is funded by the Catalunyan
government, in cooperation with the University of Barcelona. Olivier points out
that unequal conceptualisations of gender relationships create the preconditions for
violence (Bondurant 2001). It is this in particular that makes the academy suscep-
tible: it is principally male-dominated, with complex hierarchical power relations
that affect women’s learning and career choices. By studying gender violence in the
academy as a workplace, as well as a site of learning, Olivier brings together the
themes of women’s learning and work, preparing the ground for the discussion in
the next section of the book.
References
Allen, W. R., Jayakumar, U. M., Griffen, K. A., Korn, W. S., & Hurtado, S. (2005). Black under-
graduates from Bakke to Grutter: Freshmen status, trends and prospects, 1971–2004. Los
Angeles: Higher Education Research Institute.
Apple, M. W. (2006). Educating the “right” way: Markets, standards, God, and Inequality. Lon-
don: Routledge.
Boler, M. (1999). Feeling power: Emotions and education. New York: Routledge.
Bondurant, B. (2001). University women’s acknowledgment of rape. Individual, situational and
social factors. Violence Against Women, 7(3), 294–314.
Brine, J. (2006). Lifelong learning and the knowledge economy: Those that know and those that
do not—the discourse of the European Union. British Educational Research Journal, 32(5),
649–665.
Colley, H. (2006). Learning to labour with feeling: Class, gender and emotion in childcare educa-
tion and training. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 17(1), 15–29.
Davies, B. (2003). Death to critique and dissent? The policies and practices of new managerialism
and of “evidence-based practice”. Gender and Education, 15(1), 91–103.
Davies, B., & Saltmarsh, S. (2007). Gender economies: Literacy and the gendered production of
neo-liberal subjectivities. Gender and Education, 19(1), 1–20.
2â•… Part I: Introduction 17
Faulkner, W. (2004). Strategies of Inclusion: Gender and the Information Society. European Com-
mission, 5th Framework, Information Society Technologies (IST) Programme. Edinburgh:
SIGIS.
Faulkner, W. (2007). Nuts and bolts and people. Gender-troubled engineering identities. Social
Studies of Science, 37(3), 331–358.
Hall, S. (1992). Introduction: Identity in question. In S. Hall, D. Held, & T. McGrew (Eds.), Mo-
dernity and its futures. Cambridge: Polity.
Leathwood, C., & Francis, B. (Eds.). (2006). Gender and lifelong learning: Critical feminist en-
gagements. London: Routledge.
Merrill, B. (2007). Recovering class and the collective. In L. West, P. Alheit, A. Bron, A. Siig An-
dersen, & B. Merrill (Eds.), Using biographies and life history approaches in the study of adult
and lifelong learning. Frankfurt a.€M.: Lang.
Murphy, P., & Whitelegg, E. (2006). Girls in the physics classroom: A review of research on the
participation of girls in physics. London: The Institute of Physics.
Osborne, R. L. (1995). The continuum of violence against women in Canadian universities. To-
ward a new Understanding of the Chilly Campus Climate. Women’s Studies International Fo-
rum, 18(5/6), 637–646.
Stacey, R., & Griffin, D. (2005). Experience and method: A complex responsive processes per-
spective on research in organisations. In R. Stacey & D. Griffin (Eds.), A complexity perspec-
tive on researching organisations. London: Routledge.
Thomas, L. (2001). Power, assumptions and prescriptions: A critique of widening participation
policy-making. Higher Education Policy, 14(4), 361–376.
Chapter 3
Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching
and€Learning: A Gender Perspective
Ursula Murray
Whilst tutoring adult students online for a personal development skills course, the
absence of any meaningful relationship with them prompted my own need to reflect
and learn from this experience. Little attention is currently given to questions of
student–teacher relatedness in considering the purpose and roles of higher educa-
tion. This chapter will explore and re-assert the importance of a relational model
of teaching and learning and consider the impact of gender on this approach to
teaching.
I will begin by addressing the wider changes in the education of adults in the UK
and particularly the impact on women. I will then place these changes in the context
of the marketisation of education and public services more generally. The introduc-
tion of ‘business model’ ways of thinking into the educational sphere in the UK has
had a major impact on current pedagogical practice, and yet alternative thinking
about pedagogy from the past still resonates today. This in turn raises interesting
questions as to what is knowledge which lays the basis for my understanding of the
role of story as a research methodology. Using three stories from my own research,
I then seek to capture the kind of interactions experienced in different teaching and
learning contexts. While these are drawn from the UK, the policy development and
data analyses that follow have resonance with learning developments in the broader
international context. Several key themes emerge: firstly, the importance for stu-
dents of being able to connect up their learning from experience with an engage-
ment with theory; secondly, the critical role of the teacher as a ‘container’ of student
anxieties; finally, whether and how the gender of learners impacts on this kind of
interactive and experiential way of teaching. Each theme also draws attention to the
under-the-surface experiences of any learning situation. They highlight the contri-
bution that psycho-social thinking could make towards a better understanding of
what takes place in the classroom, and also to rebutting the narrow, linear ways of
thinking which are coming to dominate how we understand pedagogical practice.
U. Murray ()
Department of Social Policy, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK
e-mail: u.murray@bbk.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 19
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_3, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
20 U. Murray
The past decade has witnessed the impact of education systems re-conceived as a
supply side lever of the UK’s long-term economic survival. Enhancing ‘skills,’ as
advocated by the Leitch Report (Leitch 2006), has radically reshaped higher educa-
tion policies in the UK. This is bringing about paradoxical changes in the education
of adult learners more generally. There is an increased recognition of the role of
adult learning and more resources for some parts of the system where new skills
and employability training is being prioritised. However, this is paralleled by an
erosion of traditional forms of access to adult education and an understanding of
adult education for its own sake which, for example, played a part in bringing about
social change for women.
The refocusing of attention of the education of adults on employability and on
access to employment undermines a long tradition which served the interests of old-
er people and women in particular. Kamler (2006, p.€156), for example, describes
the kind of accessible, creative writing project which can challenge negative and
diminishing narratives of ageing. But the funding for this kind of non-skill-based
course is fast disappearing. As fees rise, subsidy is withdrawn and classes fold.
Potential students find they are being encouraged to organise courses themselves
which in turn is undermining an inclusive and properly supported professional ser-
vice. A community librarian working with a local authority adult learning service
described to me how a woman had come in looking for a course. She had told her
that she now had a 9-to-5 job and did not have to work evenings, but did not want to
stay at home every night with a husband who would only watch a foreign language
TV channel. She wanted a course for relaxation. However, the worker had to advise
her that yoga was all that was on offer to someone like herself. Yoga, this worker
told me, was typical of their marketing strategy aimed at drawing in learners with a
view primarily to encouraging them to then move on to work-related, skills-based
courses.
The Director of the National Institute for Adult and Continuing Education
(NIACE) has pointed out how this re-direction of funding has rapidly resulted
in 1.4€million fewer adults in Learning and Skills Council funded courses in the
further education (FE) sector (Tucket 2008). The head of education and training
of the shop workers union (USDAW) has also pointed out that “closing the skill
gap is opening up a social divide” (Rees 2008). His concern is that the policy
shift discriminates against those who work in the lowest skilled jobs because the
new subsidy is focussed on the skills needed to develop you to do your job. As
opportunities for such workers to develop new skills are generally not a priority
for employers in his sector they lose out. In his view, this discriminates against
those in the lowest paid jobs. Inevitably, this has significant gender implica-
tions, as 81% of the lowest paid workers in the UK are women (Daly and Rake
2003, p.€82).
3â•… Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching and Learning 21
Marketising Education
Such changes in adult education also need to be understood as part of the wider pro-
cess of marketisation of public services in the UK more generally over the past three
decades. While the discussion that follows is drawn from UK policy development,
the propagation of neoliberal policies in education is affecting other western and
westernised societies. The neo-liberal ‘modernisation’ of public services has been
closely associated with embedding a private sector derived ‘business model’. The
‘New Public Management’ (Hood 1991; McLaughlin et€al. 2002) and the manageri-
alism which ensued, has brought with it an emphasis on performance measurement,
targets and learning outcomes, the importance of the user as customer, the prioritisa-
tion of the role of IT and an understanding of equalities more as human resources
competencies rather than as the outcome of collective social movements. In parts
of the public sector such as local government, a private public service sector is now
very well established. The parallel extension of this market thinking into higher
education has been discussed more fully by Tolofari (2005) and Davies (2003).
In 2007, after a 10-year lifespan, the demise of the Learning and Skills Council
(LSC) was announced. This has led to adult learning passing to a Department for
Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS)1. Previously, the LSC was responsible
for funding adult as well as young people’s learning in FE, and the Higher Educa-
tion and Funding Council for England (Hefce) for funding adult learning in higher
education. The absence of a reference to education in the title of the then new DIUS
signals a new blurring of education and training. In its wake there is also a major
shift in thinking towards co-funding with employers through the initiative ‘Train to
Gain’. This enables employers to become ‘gatekeepers’ or commissioners of new
streams of public funding for higher education. It represents the introduction of the
purchaser/provider split already widely experienced in health and local authority
services.
In April 2008, the DIUS announced the co-funding by employers of 30,000 new
university places and the launching of ten new skill orientated universities. This
consolidates a funding shift towards ‘Foundation degrees’ in both FE and universi-
ties as a means to encourage wider participation and access routes into full higher
education degrees. The (as then) new DIUS minister, also announced a review of
higher education. As an advocate of closer links with industry and widening access
and encouraging innovation, the expectation in policy terms is that he may lean
towards a reduced emphasis on the research role of universities, resulting in an
increased separation of research and teaching only universities.
All these developments have aroused concern among some academics about
merely re-branding employer-based training as higher education and the sidelin-
ing of research and academic scholarship. Debates such as that between Adrian
Monk and Antony Grayling (Monk and Grayling 2008) reflected the sharply differ-
ing views about how far public money should be closely tied to promoting particu-
1╇
DIUS was itself replaced in mid 2009.
22 U. Murray
Where does adult and lifelong learning sit within this progressively more marke-
tised understanding and structure of higher education? Mojab (2006) has critiqued
how the changing economy has underpinned the re-organisation of adult education
into a training, learning, and skilling enterprise more fully responsive to the require-
3â•… Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching and Learning 23
ments of the market. Within this political and economic context ‘lifelong learn-
ing’ has, she argues, been deployed in two ways. Firstly, it is a central concept in
the hegemonic claim that lack of skills causes unemployment which supposes that
constant retraining prepares workers to be ultimately adaptable, and always ready
to acquire new skills as the needs of capital dictate. Secondly, ‘lifelong learning’
has been deployed as an ideological distraction that shifts the burden of increasing
adaptability onto the worker, and at the same time also acts as a ray of hope for a
more democratic and engaged citizenship. She rightly asks why is lifelong learning
being enthusiastically endorsed by some adult educators, policy makers, the busi-
ness community and others; and poses the question, should we welcome it or resist
it? Is it just a hollowed-out concept which merely invites a cynical response?
Winners and losers in terms of funding support and access to higher education
for adult learners are both evident now. Certainly, the decision by the DIUS in early
2008 to pursue the withdrawal of subsidy funding from students wanting to take
equivalent or lower level higher education qualifications (ELQs) seems a perverse
interpretation of lifelong learning. It reflects a decision to privilege access for young
people to university over mature students and it specifically undermines widely
valued routes used by women seeking to re-skill after career breaks in caring roles.
Yet at the same time, it is equally the case that the expansion of the Foundation
degree route into higher education can be seen as widening access and providing a
stepping stone for different groups of women to access higher education. It particu-
larly compensates those who missed out on earlier educational opportunities. But
policy may be changing again with a re-orientation towards addressing professional
development programmes if account is taken anecdotal evidence from within the
field of practice.
Although institutionally many faculties of lifelong learning are being main-
streamed out of existence, the ideas around ‘lifelong learning’ are a contested space
in which debates about the policies and purpose of higher education have been
argued out. There is concern about overcompliance with a work-orientated, em-
ployability ‘skills agenda’, which has prompted a robust defence of traditional ap-
proaches to scholarship and maintenance of academic standards. The implication
is that standards are being sacrificed in a rush to develop industrialised forms of
teaching in the new world of higher education as a business response that brings
larger numbers and wider participation. There is a questioning of outcome-based
models of learning which imply that a tutor can and should predetermine what will
be achieved in any session. Cummins (2002, p.€116) describes a strategy of ‘stra-
tegic compliance’ in which key outcomes are delivered in order to maintain target-
free zones of learning.
These concerns are valid, but does the polarisation of positions as expressed
in the debate between Monk and Grayling (Monk and Grayling 2008) necessarily
stand up? New approaches to teaching are called for in addressing the needs of ac-
cess and Foundation degree students and are not to be equated with a lowering of
academic standards. In the past, pedagogical practice has always been innovative
and varied in the wider adult education world, whilst continuing to be shaped by
the depth of an academic discipline. I would argue this alternative tradition also re-
24 U. Murray
ments and emotional experiences. The powerful gender differences we acquire are
part and parcel of this: not innate but deeply embedded.
Gilligan’s study In a Different Voice (1982) set out to counter research by Kohlberg
(1981) whose fallacious and essentialising theory suggested that young men had a
more developed moral sense of right and wrong because they more easily adopted
a philosophical form of reasoning. In contrast to this, Gilligan argued that young
women were caught up in situations shaped by the complexities of the human re-
lationships in which they found themselves. As a consequence, she suggested that
young women were penalised as intellectually and morally deficient rather than be-
ing understood as having been socialised into a different way of reasoning which is
more involved with the complicated ambiguities and paradoxes of human relating.
All of this raises interesting and contentious questions within the traditions of
social science as to how we understand ‘knowledge’ and the legitimacy of ‘learning
from experience’ and from personal narratives versus ‘objectivity’. Minsky (1998,
p.€218) questions why academics balk at a ‘tangled web’ of biological, cultural, and
unconscious elements which produce different ways of knowing and she concludes
that academics “prefer signifiers and abstract notions of desire to desiring bodies
and a notion of knowledge, truth and morality derived from personal experience”
(Minsky 1998, p.€225). She goes on to suggest that ‘thinking’ can become a sub-
stitute for feeling and sexuality and a form of dissociation and mastery. Walzer
(1987) emphasises the potential capacity for engagement alongside detachment and
the ability to remain “a little bit to one side but not outside a situation” (quoted by
Hoggett 2002, p.€18). Stacey and Griffin (2005, p.€9) similarly speak of “a paradox
of detached involvement”. Eagleton (2003, pp.€128–129) also makes a very direct
connection between ethics, emotions, and politics in which he sees moral capaci-
ties such as care, selflessness, vigilance, and protectiveness as social attributes. He
points out we rely on sharing our affective and communicative life with others,
otherwise literally we do not become persons. For Eagleton, the moral and material
are two sides of the same coin. He also argues for valuing objectivity as dispassion-
ate judgement and bringing ‘disinterestedness’ (p.€169) to bear as the opposite of
self-interest. As he points out, this is an arduous and emotionally taxing affair as
it is about grappling with self-deception. Objectivity he suggests, “requires a pas-
sion for doing the kinds of justice which might throw open your most deep-seated
prejudices to revision” (p.€134).
Finally, Worth (2005) has argued that there are two kinds of reasoning which we
regularly use to make sense of our world and our experiences: discursive and nar-
rative reasoning. She points out that discursive reasoning relies on logic, reasoned
argument, inductive and deductive reasoning, and conceptualisation in an ordered
string of events. Narrative reasoning, on the other hand, is abductive reasoning,
which depends on a narrative to order a certain experience. It is a “form of reason-
26 U. Murray
ing that can find morals, reasons, explanations, description, inference, causation
(on occasions but not necessarily), and all kinds of other information through the
understanding of narrative, particularly well-constructed narrative” (Worth 2005,
pp.€11–12). She adds that since we do not tend to think of reliable inferences as
coming from anything other than discursive reasoning, we end up having an ex-
tremely limited notion of where belief and true justified belief can come from. We
may not be expert storytellers, but in most, if not all, adults it is one of the primary
ways we impose coherence and give meaning to our experience. Narrative then
is an under-represented form of reasoning, grounded in everyday storytelling as a
form of communication.
What does bringing emotional and rational experiences together in teaching mean
in practical terms? Does teaching with a relational focus impact differently with
male and female students? In what ways does encouraging students to draw on their
own experience bring about experiences of transforming ethical reflection?
To explore these questions I will draw on my own stories of teaching, using an
ethnographically influenced narrative research methodology which is also integral
to my own approach to teaching and learning practice. As noted above, stories cap-
ture the ambivalence and paradoxes which are the stuff of lived experience. They
are the carriers of emotion and are thus about much more than information. Stiles
(1995, pp.€125–126) points out that “When you’ve heard a story you know more
than you can say”. In qualitative research terms, stories are sources of rich data
which can then be subjected to critical analysis.
The use of story in this way still challenges academic norms of rational, objec-
tive, knowledge, but it has specific theoretical roots. My own story-based narrative
research methodology draws on a synthesis of two theoretical frameworks which
emphasises an ethnographic or participant observation stance (Murray 2006). I drew
firstly, on a narrative research methodology which is informed by complexity sci-
ences and learning theory described by Stacey and Griffin (2005, p.€13). The second
framework draws from a psycho-social approach to research elaborated by Cooper
and Lousada (2005, p.€205). While there are certain differences between these two
discourses, both emphasise the importance of interrogating one’s lived experience.
Complexity theory emphasises uncertainty and the need for diversity and nov-
elty as key elements in nurturing creativity (Stacey 2003a, b). Conversation and
story are seen as metaphors for this way of thinking which radically challenges the
need for control and certainty as expressed through the audit culture with its per-
vasive emphasis on measuring targets and outcomes. Using story and narrative as
a research method, Stacey and Griffin (2005, p.€22) emphasise the need for ‘taking
one’s experience seriously’, and see this as encouraging a reflexive, ethical way of
critiquing one’s own experience and capturing how power relations emerge in every
social interaction. Drawing on early thinking using this approach, Aram and Noble
3â•… Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching and Learning 27
I will now take three stories from my own research that convey what the experience
of a relational approach has meant in practice in differing educational contexts.
These three stories are Story 1: ‘A Place to Think’; Story 2: ‘An Intergenerational
Workshop’ and Story 3: ‘Learning Reviews’. Each story is an extract selected from
longer stories.
This first story is about teaching a social policy certificate/diploma course with a
strong gender and critical management component. The course brings together a di-
verse student group and functions as an access course to higher education for some
and as a post-degree springboard for others who continue onto masters courses.
…After some general discussion one student raises the point that her single homeless
organisation is dominated by women at the management level. I am pleased with this con-
tribution as I want to begin to open up the differences between women and I steer the
discussion further into what equality issues arise in women-dominated organisations. I am
aware that this shift mirrors the group itself—what is happening in the here and now in
the room—and could trigger strong feelings. The thought passes through my mind as to
whether any conflict might arise, and I am aware of my momentary anxiety. Different
views are expressed over parental leave, and the sense of discrimination single women feel
is sharply articulated by several women and this becomes the focus of discussion. Beyond
this, the group struggles to differentiate differences between women, ignoring or avoiding
obvious differences around race and other potential equality differences. To illustrate a
28 U. Murray
This ‘group behaviour’ event (Obholzer 1994, p.€45; Stapley 2006; OPUS 2007)
brought together 16–19-year-old students with ‘older’ students (mainly women stu-
dents in their twenties and thirties on various access courses in further education).
Their joint task was to explore and understand their generational differences. As one
of a team of consultants to the group, I was allocated to a room in which I waited,
unsure if anyone would come to make use of it.
…Eventually a group of ten young women noisily came into the room and launch off talk-
ing about how they felt about ‘older people’ and their dislike of teachers with whom they
felt no sense of a relationship, particularly, they said, those who took a “this is not my
business attitude”. This made them feel, they say, that there was no respect, no trust, and
very judged: in short that there was no confidence in them. Sitting quietly to one side of
the room I take this as a warning to myself. I wonder anxiously whether at any moment
they will decide to just get up and leave. But they then move on to talk animatedly about
being strongly motivated by some teachers who related to them and had clear boundaries. I
make a few comments on the themes which have dominated their conversation, but clearly
signal it is for them to shape their conversation. They follow this with reflections about the
experience of being young, black and demonised in the media. They comment on how the
way they speak and dress provokes great anxiety and tensions in their parents, but they also
express the desire for them “to sit us down and just talk to us”.
3â•… Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching and Learning 29
In the following year, the course was radically redesigned. It became a fully in-
tegrated course module around a complex weave of subject discipline, academic
study skills and personal development planning. So a year later I was in a position
to make comparisons with a very different experience of teaching the first module
of a Foundation degree for public sector management students.
…As the term unfolds, Damian remarks that he found the first readings “easy but also
hard”. He goes on to tell the group “the reading you gave us was not asking me how some-
thing was to be done but why something was happening and that feels very different from
work”. I feel energised by his insight and recognise that he has grasped a depth of under-
standing about the fundamental transition to university through his own very honest reflec-
tions about his anxious feelings. Later in the term, I ask the group to undertake a close
observation of user-worker interaction in their workplaces which they will use as a basis
for an essay but also an oral presentation. Solly describes how he was shocked at the imper-
sonal way an elderly couple are treated in a council benefits office. He notes the absence of
any awareness of the emotional impact of such ways of interacting. In his presentation, he
connects this up to a key reading about the role of ‘social defences’ (Hoggett 2000, p.€151)
in the workplace and how this shapes behaviours. His reading has illuminated his experi-
ence. It prompts him to discuss the experience with colleagues and his family, drawing
them into thinking with him about what all of this means. As the students connect up and
reflect on their rich observations of the familiar in unfamiliar ways, there is also a growing
openness between them. I realise with pleasure that the class is becoming a place to think.
Several key themes emerge from these stories: firstly, the importance for students of
being able to connect up their own experiences in a dialogue with theory; secondly,
the critical role of the teacher as a ‘container’ of student anxieties, particularly about
30 U. Murray
the legacy of past failures in education; finally, the degree to which relational and
interactive ways of teaching work well across both genders.
All the stories emphasise the importance of ‘taking one’s own experience seri-
ously’ (Stacey and Griffin 2005, p.€22). Learning is clearly engendered through the
connecting up of experiential awareness, critical thought, and ethical reflection.
Story 1: ‘A Place to Think’, captures a flow of developing insight around the expe-
rience of inequality and power. As the conversation emerges in unforeseen ways,
people contribute and risk speaking. They begin to speak more freely in ways which
reveal that they feel safe enough to connect with their own specific experiences and
in some cases reveal a vulnerability. Story 3: ‘Learning Reviews’ also emphasises
how our life histories are always integral to the way we come to interpret what we
mean by learning and knowledge. It underlines the importance of ‘process’ rather
than just exposure to academic content. The students develop self awareness of
what their own learning involves as they come to understand their move from a
‘how’ culture of work to the ‘why’ culture of university. They see the relevance of
critical thought to their own lives coming to know their own experience rather than
merely knowing about objective, social policy theory alone.
Ideally, we contain our own emotions, but under situations of stress this is often
not possible. Any learning experience arouses anxiety, and it is necessary for this to
be ‘contained’ if one is to take the risk of speaking and interacting in ways which
lead to thought and new insights. In Story 1: ‘A Place to Think’, I am also aware of
the anxiety aroused in myself, but I am able to build on the relationships formed to
provide the necessary containment of student anxiety as this rises. We see in Story
2: ‘The Intergenerational Workshop’, how the ‘older’ students (in their twenties and
thirties who were mainly also mothers), were quickly pushed into a parental role by
the younger students, triggering acute anxiety in them and provoking an extremely
authoritarian response as the event unfolded around such issues and conflicts as
dress codes. In my small group session with the younger students, I was eventually
made very aware of how I was experienced as someone who listened.
Story 3: ‘Learning Reviews’ contrasts the initial absence with the subsequent
presence of a relationship which contains anxiety. The sense of disconnectedness
where face-to-face contact was minimal contrasts markedly with the interactive
model of teaching adopted the following year. It highlights the phantasy that online
support can automatically be a substitute for a face-to-face relationship. The ab-
sence of any real inter-personal relationships induced a sense of disconnection and
failure in myself. Although there is limited research into successful models of PDP
implementation, the available evidence is that students benefit when it is integrated
fully with other elements of their study programme. This example would substanti-
ate this and the need for a relationship between student and teacher as an integral
element of this.
Finally, what do the stories tell us about gender? Overall the stories suggest
that, given a supportive environment, male students as well as female students can
respond just as positively to a teaching approach which called on them to reflect on
their own experiences. In Story 3:’Learning Review’, the male students positively
embraced it. In Story 1: ‘A Place to Think’, the all women group provided a text-
3â•… Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching and Learning 31
book example of the adeptness of many women managers in the practice of ‘soft
skills’ (Strebler 1997). However, I found that individual woman students in Story 3
‘Learning Reviews’ were not always at ease with such empathetic skills, underlin-
ing the danger of stereotyping gendered behaviours. Acquiring rational, cognitive
skills such as target setting and time management can also be the dominant need for
some women at a particular moment.
Menzies (1960/1988) examined what happens when people are trapped in insti-
tutions which do not respect emotional experience in this way and do not provide
the necessary level of emotional containment. She defined the concept of ‘social
defences against anxiety’ which will then arise in such workplace. Applying this
concept to present day higher education, Cummins and Thomas (2006) reflect on
high dropout rates, plagiarism, and dependent and self-destructive behaviour. They
conclude that the problem is less about failing individuals and more about the rela-
tions going on between student and teacher and institution. In other words, the solu-
tion does not lie in more study skills support but rather in preserving and building
on those aspects of current teaching which provide for a relational model. The move
to impersonal industrialised learning works against a sense of connection and pro-
duces the experience of absence and unavailability. In other words, the institutional
systems are not emotionally containing but impersonal. Cummins and Thomas ar-
gue for a return to a tutorial-based system so that the dependency needs of students
are better met, this being the precursor to becoming an independent learner. Their
analysis closely echoes the shift described in Story 3: ‘Learning Reviews’ with
the move away from a largely impersonal, online approach for PDP courses and
towards developing a successful module with a ‘complex weave’ around the sub-
ject discipline in which the relationship between teacher and student is once again
central.
Conclusion
The dominant view in education now places great emphasis on performance, com-
petencies, and learning as skill acquisition. The role of a ‘teacher’ is increasingly
being interpreted as one of ensuring delivery of predefined outcomes. This ‘busi-
ness model’ language penetrates ever more deeply across all public services and
now is extending into higher education. It de-emphasises the importance of learning
as a complex social interaction. There seems at best to be a growing ignorance, and
at worst a contempt, for the idea of learning as an embodied, relational process. In
psycho-social terms what is happening can be interpreted as the annihilation of an
approach which values the place of a creative ‘third space’ (Shipton 2007). Yet other
alternative approaches have always understood the impact of learning in multiple
ways—intellectually, emotionally, politically, and spiritually, and it is from these
we need to draw inspiration.
The stories in this chapter describe from a teacher’s perspective how women
but also male students in general responded well to an interactive, conversation-
al approach to teaching: one which closely integrated their reflection on learning
from experience with theory and critical judgement. The students as a consequence
developed confidence, a sense of agency, and a greater capacity for intellectual
and ethical reflection. Finally, the chapter draws attention to the way psycho-social
ideas can bring a new awareness and understanding to the ‘under the surface’ ex-
periences in the classroom. Such thinking can also contribute to a practical and
3â•… Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching and Learning 33
theoretical rebuttal of the now overly dominant linear and systems-driven ways of
thinking about teaching and learning.
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3â•… Re-asserting a Relational Model of Teaching and Learning 35
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Chapter 4
Widening Educational Participation:
Masculinities, Aspirations and Decision-Making
Processes
Introduction
P. J. Burke ()
School of Education, Roehampton University, London, UK
e-mail: p.burke@roehampton.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 37
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_4, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
38 P. J. Burke
flexible learners, and a key problem is seen as lying with those who lack the aspira-
tions to capitalise on the range of learning opportunities freely available to all.
The discourse of lifelong learning in the UK is one that favours individualism and instru-
mentalism, embedded within structures and organisations that are themselves gendered,
raced and classed. (Jackson 2003, p.€366)
contexts, such as schools and colleges, men are ‘incited to adopt certain practices of
“masculinity” and, hence, to display themselves as incumbents of certain categories
of masculinity on particular occasions’ (Martino 1999, p.€240). The men’s accounts
reveal ‘how centrally class as well as gender is implicated in psychic processes’
(Reay 2001, p.€223), and a detailed analysis uncovers the interconnections between
the auto/biographical, cultural, discursive, emotional and material in the re/fashion-
ing of gendered aspirations across individual histories.
In this chapter I draw on a qualitative study of 39 men taking access and founda-
tion programmes in three further education colleges and one university in London.
The in-depth interviews focused on the men’s educational memories, histories and ex-
periences. The interview transcripts are not analysed as reflecting an objective reality,
but as discursive and partial accounts of the men’s memories and experiences which
are produced in the specific situation of an interview. It was explained in the interview
that pseudonyms would be used, for the sake of anonymity, and each participant was
invited to select their own. Interestingly, in the majority of the cases the men selected
their pseudonym with minimal consideration and little hesitation which suggests that
the names are connected in some way to their sense of self. The men were selected
under two sets of criteria: (1) that they were categorised by the college/university as
home students and (2) that they were participating in an Access to Higher Education
course, a Foundation degree or, in the case of the university, a Science and Engineer-
ing Foundation Programme (SEFP). The colleges and university were selected for
their London location, their demographic differences and because they offered ac-
cess and/or foundation programmes. It is noteworthy that although they are all home
students, the men’s countries of origin include Pakistan, Iraq, Bangladesh, Columbia,
Kenya, Sudan, Belize, Spain, Nigeria, Bulgaria, Angola, Jamaica, Ghana, Portugal,
Poland, Italy, Cyprus and England. Their ages ranged from 18 to 54. The men’s gen-
erational and national diversity offers an analytic richness to a critical examination of
decisions and aspirations across shifting and contradictory masculine identifications.
Although widening participation (WP) has become a key policy discourse in Eng-
land with particular orientations since the New Labour government’s period in of-
fice, the project to widen access and participation in higher education has a long
history, with competing perspectives and approaches. Within these competing per-
spectives, there has been a strong commitment to redress the structural inequalities
in higher education by targeting historically under-represented groups and develop-
ing support mechanisms to increase their participation in higher education. Access
to Higher Education courses in England were initially developed with such aims
in mind, and there was a clear strand of social justice running through this project
(Kirton 1999; Burke 2002). Similarly, in the United States, a radical tradition exists
whereby affirmative action policies were put into place to redress unequal participa-
tion patterns across different social groups and to encourage in particular the partici-
pation of Black students in higher education (Allen et€al. 2005).
40 P. J. Burke
Jones and Thomas (2005) helpfully outline three contrasting approaches to WP,
although the lived reality of widening participation is perhaps far messier than this
represents. The first approach Jones and Thomas categorise as the ‘academic ap-
proach’. This strand emphasises attitudinal factors such as ‘low aspirations’. In this
approach, activities to raise aspirations are prioritised and these are located at the
peripheries of universities with ‘little or no impact on institutional structure and
culture’ (p.€617). The second approach that they outline is the ‘utilitarian approach’
which similarly focuses on attitudinal factors, including again the notion of ‘low as-
pirations’. The second approach is also concerned with lack of traditional academic
qualifications and is embedded in a deficit understanding of WP. Jones and Thomas
thus characterise the ‘utilitarian approach’ as the ‘double deficit model’ (p.€618) and
one that particularly emphasises the relationship between higher education and the
economy. The third approach they identify as ‘transformative’, which focuses on
the needs of under-represented groups in higher education. They argue that higher
status institutions are more likely to take the ‘academic approach’, less prestigious
institutions are more likely to take the ‘utilitarian approach’, leaving little space for
transformative approaches to higher education (p.€627).
In England, as most ‘non-traditional’ entrants to higher education are concentrated
in the post 1992 new universities, the hegemonic discourse of widening participation
is strongly framed by the utilitarian approach, and this is significantly influenced by
the ‘logic of neoliberal globalisation’ (Jones et€al. 1999, p.€238). Within this context,
there is a firm acceptance that the economy and marketplace are at the centre of the
project to widen participation as a key policy imperative. With notions of the market
at the centre of WP policy, the key role of HE is constructed as enhancing employ-
ability, entrepreneurialism, economic competitiveness and flexibility (Morley 1999;
Thompson 2000; Burke 2002; Archer et€al. 2003; Bowl 2003). Neoliberal market
oriented approaches significantly shape meanings of widening participation, includ-
ing what and whom higher education is for (Burke and Jackson 2007).
Davies and Saltmarsh explain that neoliberalism
espouses ‘survival of the fittest’ and unleashes competition among individuals, among
institutions and among nations, freeing them from what are construed as the burdensome
chains of social justice and social responsibility. Populations are administered and man-
aged through the production of a belief in each individual in his or her own freedom and
autonomy. (Davies and Saltmarsh 2007, p.€4)
Neoliberalism thus takes attention away from the ways that identities are impli-
cated in complex social inequalities and reduces education to a technology of self-
improvement for individual workers and consumers competing in a global market.
Although the WP policy discourse makes rhetorical gestures towards eradicating
exclusion from the different sites of lifelong learning, including higher education,
the neoliberal reconstruction of ‘exclusion’ is one that firmly asserts responsibility
to the individual named and identified as ‘excluded’. Furthermore, the hegemonic
neoliberal discourse of WP tends to operate around contradictory claims: on the
one hand, the claim of the ‘classless society’ or the ‘death of class’ and, on the
other, the powerful ways that ‘class is invoked in moves to draw young people
from deprived areas into HE’ (Lawler 2005, p.€ 798). In similar ways, issues of
gender equality are seen as irrelevant in WP policy debates, but reappear as a
national concern in relation to the perceived crisis of masculinity and the claim
that women are taking over the university (Quinn 2003). WP policy is a part of
the broader neoliberal technologies of self-regulation in which subjects come to
understand themselves as responsible for the production of a self with the skills
and qualities required to succeed in the new economy (Walkerdine 2003, p.€239).
Issues of structural inequality and cultural misrecognition become hidden in WP
policy discourse, and rather individuals are called upon to take up the challenge of
WP. Such a challenge is located in a wider neoliberal project of self-development
and improvement through participation in lifelong learning opportunities which
are presented as meritocratic and available to all who have the potential to benefit.
However, this is not to say that discourses of transformation and social justice
are not still at play to some extent in WP policy, as this quote from the Higher Edu-
cation Funding Council for England demonstrates:
Widening participation addresses the large discrepancies in the take-up of higher education
opportunities between different social groups. Under-representation is closely connected
with broader issues of equity and social inclusion, so we are concerned with ensuring equal-
ity of opportunity for disabled students, mature students, women and men, and all ethnic
groups. (HEFCE 2006)
The problematic of this excerpt becomes apparent, though, with close analytical
attention to the framing policy text which places emphasis on individuals from
under-represented groups taking responsibility to change their aspirations, disposi-
tions and values (Gewirtz 2001). This emphasis has significantly altered relations
between the individual and the state and has led to a shift from government to gov-
ernance, ‘signalling a move away from a citizen-based notion of rights associated
with a sense of the public, to an individualistic client-based notion of right based
on contractual obligations’ (Blackmore 2006, p.€ 13). Just as individual students
are responsible for their self-improvement, individual teachers and WP practitio-
ners are responsible to raise the aspirations of young, disadvantaged individuals
identified as having potential. I have argued elsewhere that aspirations are not in-
dividually formed, but are relational and interconnected with complex auto/biogra-
phies, multiple identifications and social positionings and are discursively produced
within schools, colleges and universities (Burke 2006). What is not considered in
42 P. J. Burke
Indeed, those entering higher education from ‘different’ backgrounds are often seen
as potentially contaminating of university standards, and as a result a key policy
strategy is to protect the quality of higher education by creating new and different
spaces for those new and different students (Morley 2003). For example the Gov-
ernment White Paper, The Future of Higher Education, reads:
Our overriding priority is to ensure that as we expand HE places, we ensure that the expan-
sion is of an appropriate quality and type to meet the demands of employers and the needs
of the economy and students. We believe that the economy needs more work focused
degrees—those, like our new foundation degrees, that offer specific, job-related skills. We
want to see expansion in two-year, work-focused foundation degrees; and in mature stu-
dents in the workforce developing their skills. As we do this, we will maintain the quality
standards required for access to university, both safeguarding the standards of traditional
honours degrees and promoting a step-change in the quality and reputation of workfocused
courses. (DfES 2003, p.€64, emphasis added)
In this excerpt, WP is being explicitly linked with concerns about ‘safeguarding the
standards of traditional honours degrees’. The text implies that opening access to
new student constituencies has the potential to have a negative effect on traditional
university spaces which need to be protected against the entry of ‘non-traditional’
students. It also assumes that the appropriate level of participation for those new stu-
dent constituencies is work-based degrees rather than traditional honours degrees.
This leads policy in the direction of creating new and different kinds of courses for
new and different kinds of students without addressing that these differences are
shown to be classed, gendered and racialised by research in the field (HEFCE 2005;
Reay et€al. 2005). In analysing their interviews with working-class students, Reay
et€al. (2005, p.€85) explain:
Choice for the majority [of working-class students] involved either a process of finding out
what you cannot have, what is not open for negotiation and then looking at the few options
left, or a process of self-exclusion.
4â•… Widening Educational Participation 43
In this way, the WP policy agenda is not able to challenge the status quo, or redress
the legacy of the under/mis-representation of certain social groups in traditional
forms of higher education which carry with them status and esteem. As a result en-
during hierarchies, privileges and inequalities remain untouched whilst new forms
of unequal social relations are being created (Burke 2002). This logic constructs
‘WP students’ in very particular ways and leaves notions of deficit in place. Tradi-
tional student identity is subtly held in place so that the traditional university under-
graduate is re-constituted as white-racialised and middle-classed. The ‘WP student’
is constituted as ‘Other’, deserving of higher education access, but only to ‘other’
kinds of courses and institutions.
1╇
Since writing this chapter, it has been announced that funding for Aim Higher has ceased.
44 P. J. Burke
framework, the complex social and personal histories in which particular forms of
knowledge and capital have been privileged and particular bodies have been coded
as knowledgeable are ignored. Rather, knowledge and knowing is constructed as
objective, apolitical, decontextualised, disembodied and detached from the legacy
of the misrecognition of the cultural capital, literacy practices and knowledge of
historically marginalised groups (Apple 2006).
Raising aspirations is connected to the neoliberal policy discourse of social ex-
clusion which has been critiqued by sociologists (e.g. Gewirtz 2001; Archer et€al.
2003) to expose the ways that it leaves the operations of power unexamined. Shift-
ing the attention to ‘exclusion’ and away from structural inequalities and discursive
misrecognitions operates as a mechanism to reprivilege particular cultural practices
and values. The heterogeneity of British society is framed in terms of ‘diversity’,
and yet the complex differences and inequalities behind diversity are silenced.
Importantly, sociological work emphasises that identities are produced within the
discursive sites and practices of schools, colleges and universities (Mac an Ghaill
1994). Excluded identities themselves are constructed, performed, named and pro-
duced within schools, colleges and universities (Youdell 2006). The emphasis on in-
dividual aspirations misses out the significant interconnections between a subject’s
aspirations and their classed, racialised, (hetero)sexualised and gendered identities,
ignoring the social and cultural contexts in which subjects are constructed, and
construct themselves, as having or not having potential, or indeed not choosing
to participate in higher education for a range of valid reasons (Archer and Leath-
wood 2003). Aspirations themselves are formed through social relations and iden-
tity positions; they are negotiated and renegotiated within the social contexts that
the individual is situated: they are not linear in formation, but cyclical, iterative and
reflexive (Burke 2006). Aspirations are tied to gendered identities in complex ways
that require close and qualitative analytical attention.
Aspirations are discursive and closely tied in with structural differences and in-
equalities. The men taking part in this research expressed high levels of aspira-
tion, which is not altogether surprising, considering these are men who successfully
accessed education through different alternative-entry programmes. However, the
ways in which they articulated their aspirations requires close analysis to reveal the
connections between their individual aspirations, complex decision-making pro-
cesses negotiated with others, policy and wider discourses (such as neoliberalism)
and classed, gendered and racialised identities. The processes by which the men re/
constructed their aspirations in the interviews involved taking up, rejecting, chal-
lenging and remaking identifications across space and time at local, cultural and
global levels. The processes were also closely tied to structural and material im/
possibilities as well as the different sets of capital (e.g. cultural, linguistic and so-
cial) un/available to the men. A myriad of influences shaped the men’s shifting and
4â•… Widening Educational Participation 45
In the context of his national identifications as a Pakistani man, his hopes for the
future are modest and safe, careful not to rock the boundaries of his community and
family. He imagines himself primarily as a husband and father, able to support his
family through a secure job.
Interviewer: What about now, if you think yourself ten years ahead, what do you see?
Dragon: Just a normal person with a job, hopefully, and a wife and kids and nothing too much.
46 P. J. Burke
Yet, in the discursive context of the interview, and the specific prompts used by the
interviewer, he also expresses contradictory dreams that are challenging to these
normalised versions of being a man within his community.
Interviewer: What would be a dream come true, in jobs?
Dragon: Oh I’ll be very rich, going around to countries with my job and be a very important
person. Not like a politician or anything, but close to that. And have a massive house, prob-
ably in America. I visited America and the houses over there are really nice. Very big. And
one more thing, which I want to try to make possible, is to become a cricketer. I’m a really
huge fan of cricket. I’m not actually in any clubs at the moment, and people say I should
join. And I’m OK, I can play good as well. Not really good. But just good. So that’s one of
those dreams I think is achievable with a bit of practice.
Dragon plays around with discourses of success and heterosexual masculinity, hav-
ing a huge house and being ‘a very important person’, such as a cricket celebrity.
He is drawn back-and-forth between ‘dream’ and ‘realistic’ aspirations in the inter-
view, and he fashions his ‘realistic aspirations’ around being modest, responsible
and unselfish, characteristics he associates with what it means to be a Muslim man.
Interviewer: OK, now you’ve described to me the big dream. What would you realistically
expect of yourself?
Dragon: I think a job that just pays well, just to manage my family and house. Expenses
and…maybe just occasionally holidays and things. That’s fine. Because really my religion
does say that you don’t really need much, and if you do have much you just give, so you are
equal to everyone. So I just don’t want too much. Just enough will be fine.
Unsurprisingly perhaps, families are a recurring theme in the men’s accounts about
their educational decision making, and mothers seem to play a particularly central
role in the men’s decisions. However, sociological analysis helps illuminate the
social and relational dimensions of decision making and aspiration, rather than sim-
ply focusing on individual mothers and families. Such an analysis takes account of
the complex power relations within families and the gendered relationship between
mothers and sons. It also highlights the fragile line that mothers walk when they are
supporting their children in making the ‘right’ educational choices and decisions:
a thin line between regulating and policing decision-making processes and being
caring and supportive.
Ali, a 19-year-old SEFP student originally from Iraq, speaks specifically about
his mother’s important influence in processes of decision making about his choice
of what and where to study. In his account, his mother is unable to strike the al-
most impossible balance of simultaneously being a friend and a responsible par-
ent. Ali describes the double-edged sword of parental expectations, and relates his
difficulties with A levels as an effect of the pressure his mother exerted over his
schoolwork. Ali defines his family’s background as middle-class, and his account
fits closely in with wider expectations of (middle-class) parents and sociologi-
cal literature on the relationship of middle-class parents to their child’s education
(Power et€al. 2003).
Ali: I would say my mum, she had a big influence, because I always had to do…she asked
me if I had done my work or had not done my work, how am I doing in the school, am I
doing fine? […]…even though when somebody insists that you have to do the work you
4â•… Widening Educational Participation 47
start to hate it. That’s one of the reasons now I find it a bit hard with A levels, to keep up
with my work, because always I’ve been told—we came all the way from back home, here,
for you to study and to be better. And that put more pressure on me. And when you pressure
someone he wouldn’t do as good as he wants.
Later in the interview, though, Ali talks about his admiration for his mother, who
was able to overcome what he describes as a set of catastrophic events, and through
her own determination made the decision to come to the UK to escape the ‘constant
pain’ of living in invaded Iraq. He explains that his mother comes from a wealthy
background and became a single mother after the death of his father. Concerned for
Ali’s safety due to the war, she made the ‘tough decision’ to move with the children
to England. Ali explains that his mother had specific aspirations for him to pursue
a career in medicine, while Ali wanted to go into physics. Although he was not
motivated to study, he put effort into his GCSEs because it would have been ‘cruel’
in his eyes to do any differently considering the sacrifices his mother made to seek
refuge in the UK for his safety.
Ali: Yes, even though I was trying to do something in physics I didn’t tell my mum. She
always wanted me to be a doctor, or something prestigious. So I had to just say—OK.
That’s when I really tried…actually from GCSE I started to drift away from my studies,
trying to avoid the subject, because my mum, she tells me to go and study. I tried to avoid
it. So when it came to doing the other subjects, it would be a bit cruel if I said for my mum,
because it was for myself. But I would say for mum, because I know she got through so
much hassle to get us here. But I thought it would be rewarding, even though I didn’t make
it. Still I passed.
Ali explains how he came to decide to pursue engineering, which involved sensi-
tive and careful negotiations with his mother. Engineering, he explains, fits in better
with his ‘personality’ than medicine, and he seems to take up neoliberal discourses
around entrepreneurialism, ambition and self-determination. This again exposes the
complex processes involved in decision and aspiration making which, in Ali’s case,
is linked to his mother’s perspectives, her auto/biography and its relationship to his
experiences, his self-identifications and hegemonic discourses around acceptable
careers for young men in the UK.
Ali appears to position himself in relation to neoliberal discourses of success and
determination. He constructs himself as immune to any social constraints because
he has a goal and so he is able to overcome anything through his individual determi-
nation and self-belief. In this way, he might be seen as the ideal ‘widening partici-
pation student’ who constructs himself in relation to discourses of meritocracy and
sees success as available to all men who work hard, adapt to ‘British culture’ and
are willing to give ‘whatever it takes’ to succeed. Ali explains:
First of all, when I came from Iraq, for me it doesn’t make a difference wherever I go.
Wherever I go I feel home, for some reason I don’t know. People say they are homesick and
stuff, but for me I just adapt to it because I have to. Because I’ve got a goal, which is to be
successful. So whatever it takes, I will.
Many of the men in this research had complex experiences of migration, and their
aspirations are formed between and across competing discourses about forms of
masculinity and aspiration in different familial, national and cultural contexts. In
48 P. J. Burke
some of the men’s accounts, ‘British culture’ is idealised and contrasted to their
‘home cultures’. Furthermore, the theme of families and parenting is different
across the data set, as the older men also form their decisions in relation to their
own identifications as parents. For example, when Skiddo is asked what he has
learned in his access course, he answers in terms of gaining broader values as a
father, specifically values of love and respect. Skiddo is a 30-year-old Access to
Health studies, Nursing and Midwifery student at an East London further educa-
tion college from an African background. He is self-defined working-class. His
account resonates with Gewirtz’ critique of New labour policies that were focused
on working on the marginalised to become more like white, middle-class parents
(Gewirtz 2001).
At home? You can never compare them because what I have learned here is respect and
love, and you don’t have that from the teachers there. If I was back home the love that I
have for my daughter, I don’t believe I should have now, because there you just believe
everybody is looking after themselves. Some parents, they don’t even see their kids for
days, weeks, but they live in the same house, get out in the morning, come back in the night,
and don’t even check to see if they are asleep well. Too many things I have learned I can
never compare them, because it depends on the society. It is not a bad thing for them, but it
is just a way of life in that part of the world.
Although there are generational differences in the men’s accounts, there are also
similarities. Like Ali, Skiddo takes up neoliberal discourses of flexibility, individu-
alism and adaptability in explaining his decisions and aspirations, but also ideal-
type student-dispositions. Both Skiddo and Ali explain their decisions through fa-
miliar narratives of positive thinking, working towards a goal, staying focused and
moving forward. They both take up neoliberal discourses in making sense of their
migration experiences and in coping with the challenges that face them, both as
students and as living in new cultural environments. For example, Skiddo says:
I would say I am the type of person, I adapt to any situation and any environment very
quickly. When I left my country I left everything behind me, but I never thought about who
I was and what I left, and stuff. I just think there is a challenge ahead of me. So I would say
when I left there I forgot what I used to do. I would think that part of being a businessman
inside me, probably might do something part time like that. But now I am focused on doing
what I want to do now.
Although the kinds of discourses Skiddo draws on have resonance with the success
narratives of neoliberalism, he also locates himself firmly in relation to the tribal
values of his home community:
Bamlake, Bamlake is a very proud tribe. So I am proud to be a Bamlake. They are business
inclined and hard working. Most people from this tribe are always doing well.
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Chapter 5
Innovatory Educational Models for Women
Returners in Science, Engineering and
Technology Professions
Introduction
Women returning to work after a break have been the target of programmes and
initiatives within the adult and higher education sectors for many years: they have
also been the focus of government concern at times of skills shortages. Often draw-
ing on feminist principles and pedagogies, such initiatives have generally aimed
to empower women and raise their awareness of gender issues at the same time as
offering skills and training in preparation for employment (Coats 1996; Ellen and
Herman 2005; Phipps 2008). The initiative discussed in this chapter has its roots in
these traditions but, by using an online environment, the government has been able
to offer a new programme to a wider and more diversely distributed target group,
as well as focussing on the needs of a specific group: women already qualified in
Science, Engineering or Technology (SET) subject areas.
The chapter begins by outlining the continuing problem of under-representation
of women and girls in SET including the specific needs of women in these sectors.
We then discuss the background to, and rationale for, a recent programme of support
measures developed by the UK government, one of which is an innovative online
course which was developed by an established network of educators with a com-
mitment to gender issues. The course, aimed at women SET graduates who want to
return to work in this employment sector after a career break, is described and its
impact discussed. We, the authors of this paper, are all members of the team respon-
sible for creation and delivery of this course. We have also been involved (along
with an external independent team) in evaluating how well the course has achieved
its objectives. In this context, we are action researchers; the research data continue
to be collected on the course, and changes to the course are made iteratively in re-
sponse to this research and to other aspects of the environment. We end this chapter
by generalising from our experience to make some recommendations for taking
forward this kind of innovatory educational model for women returners in other
C. Herman ()
Department of Communication and Systems, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
e-mail: c.herman@open.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 53
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_5, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
54 C. Herman et al.
areas. The recommendations are relevant within a global context, but this chapter is
mainly concerned with UK employment priorities, and the models discussed were
developed to meet these.
Despite changes in science curricula in the UK and elsewhere over the past two de-
cades, participation in SET at higher education level and in careers remains highly
gender segregated. Predictions that compulsory study of science for all up to age 16
would result in more girls flowing through the educational pipeline into SET careers
have resulted in disappointingly small increases in numbers. Educational choices,
particularly for girls and particularly in science, are influenced by a complex web of
interacting factors so that changes in curricula alone are unlikely to alter the situa-
tion radically to result in significantly increased numbers of girls choosing to study
SET subjects (Murphy and Whitelegg 2006). This situation is replicated at an inter-
national level with many other studies showing similar patterns in other countries,
and leading to global concerns about the consequences of such continued inequality.
The analogy of a leaky pipeline has commonly been used to illustrate the decline
in the participation of girls and women in SET through the education system and
into careers. For a minority of young women who do choose to continue with their
study of SET beyond compulsory schooling into higher education and beyond, the
pipeline narrows and leaks more rapidly as they encounter more and more barriers
and constraints to their progress at each stage (Rees 2001). This is illustrated by a
study of young women members of the Institute of Physics who were embarking
on research careers in physics. The study (Whitelegg et€al. 2002) revealed direct
and indirect gender barriers to progression via perceived institutional employment
practices and the prevalent male culture or atmosphere in physics research which
created what has been called a ‘chilly climate’ for women. This perception of a
‘chilly climate’ is not unique to working in physics research, or specific to a lab
environment (Erwin and Maurutto 1998).
As revealed in this and other comparable studies, the male culture in SET is
seen as being more confrontational and self-confident, and encourages sharing of
new ideas and contacts within a small, usually all-male circle. Female students are
often reluctant to challenge this, feeling themselves to be in a fairly powerless posi-
tion, and are more likely to try to work within the culture. Those women who have
gained established positions in SET careers can be an important source of support
and act as positive role models for the younger females. However, because there
are few of them, their achievement becomes very visible, and failure can have a
disproportionately negative effect.
Women’s perceptions of a career path in SET research reveal concerns which
relate to: the long hours’ culture; the difficulty of returning to work after a career
break (especially when a gap in candidates’ publication records counts against
them); the need to get back up to date and the difficulty of doing this; the challenge
5â•… Innovatory Educational Models for Women Returners 55
of combining research work with childcare, and the difficulty of working part-time
when employed on research grants.
These issues emerge further down the career pipeline and are not evident to
young graduates. The situation in physics is mirrored to a greater or lesser extent
throughout the other SET areas. In engineering, the ‘chilly climate’ manifests itself
by the use of gendered language and forms of address to refer to engineers, men-
only social circles and the necessity of a female engineer becoming ‘one of the lads’
to belong; sexual visibility and harassment are also a problem, as is the limited range
of topics available for conversations, and invisibility as a professional (Faulkner
2006). Even in the Biological Sciences, where the participation of girls is initially
greater than in other areas of SET, the numbers of females working at the higher
levels in research or management careers are not representative of the numbers who
embark on this subject. This situation has not changed over several decades.
The UK has seen a renewed awareness of this problem over the past decade at a na-
tional policy level, prompted initially by the perceived shortage of a skilled labour
force in SET employment sectors. As a response, the Government commissioned
a review of the supply of scientists and engineers as part of its strategy to improve
the UK’s productivity and innovation performance. The review identified several
factors, specifically some contributing to the supply difficulties faced by the female
SET workforce(Roberts 2002). However, the Roberts Review, as it is known, ac-
knowledged that it was not within its scope specifically to consider the issue of the
shortage of women in SET, so Baroness Susan Greenfield was asked to prepare a
separate report (Greenfield 2002) specifically to look into this. In addition to iden-
tifying the need for training in SET, at around the same time the Department for
Trade and Industry published the Maximising Returns report (People Science and
Policy Ltd 2002) which, amongst other things, identified that a large pool of female
SET graduates had returned to employment, but were working in non SET sectors.
This raised awareness not only of the need to make SET careers attractive places
for women to participate in, but also of the need to tackle the problems that women
encountered when returning to work in SET after a career break.
As mentioned at the start of this chapter, initiatives to support women in SET
and women returners have been in existence in the UK for many years (see Phipps
2008), but many of these were short lived and local. One of the key recommenda-
tions of Baroness Greenfield’s report was to ‘reduce fragmentation of efforts and
to enable stakeholders to play an active and effective part in change’ (Greenfield
2002, p.€9). This recommendation led to the setting up of the UK Resource Centre
for Women in SET (UKRC)1 whose brief was to act as an umbrella organisation for
all bodies who were concerned with women in SET in the UK and to hold funds
1╇
http://www.ukrc4setwomen.org/.
56 C. Herman et al.
In the UK, distance education has been extremely successful at encouraging adult
women’s participation in SET and other subjects of study, both as novices in the
field and as ‘returners’. Distance education, as its forerunner correspondence edu-
cation, has provided many women, in many countries, with their only chance to
learn when other educational institutions were inaccessible to them. As a system
for women specifically, it can be traced back to 1873 and the Society to Encourage
Studies at Home, which offered distance education to adult women in the East Coast
of the United States (Watkins 1991).
The evidence suggests that this is a form of education that many women still
find more accessible and flexible than other forms of education at specific times
in their lives (Lunneborg 1994; Swarbrick 1980; Kirkup and von Prümmer 1997).
(In 2006, for example, women were 61% of Open University undergraduates.) But
there are aspects of the system of distance education that have been criticised. A
specific gender-related criticism is that distance education has reinforced the iso-
lation and domestication of women in the home, rather than emancipating them
through participation in a public educational space (Farnes 1988). Distance educa-
5â•… Innovatory Educational Models for Women Returners 57
tion has also been criticised for being a ‘Fordist’ model of industrial production
applied to education (Peters 1983): something that large-scale distance institutions,
now calling themselves ‘Mega-Universities’ (Daniel 1996), are no longer ashamed
of. They would argue that digital technologies applied to large-scale educational
systems allow them to become flexible, accessible, post-modern institutions. In this
chapter we sympathise with that position, arguing that digital technologies have al-
lowed us to produce something innovatory for our women students. However, we
take seriously those well-argued critiques of digital technologies that consider them
to be gendered (Adam 1998; Wyatt et€al. 2000). Research evidence of the impact
on women of digital technologies when applied to learning (e-learning) is contra-
dictory. A number of studies find women disadvantaged when using e-learning,
while others, for example Selwyn (2007), have argued that in Western universi-
ties, although many aspects of computer-based activity (e.g. playing games and
downloading music) are still gendered as male, e-learning is seen by many students
as being a female activity. A number of reports by the Pew Internet and American
life project have shown that women and girls are more active than men and boys
in many aspects of online social networking (Pew 2008). We believe that when
e-learning is carefully designed to match the resources and learning preferences of
women students, it can be very successful.
Many Open University women students are investing in their own professional
updating and education so as to prepare themselves better to re-enter the work-
force; they are already ‘flexible workers’ (Robins and Webster 1999) engaged in
lifelong learning, taking personal responsibility for developing their own employ-
ment-related skills and knowledge. These women have always made up a signifi-
cant part of the OU student population. As they moved in and out of the labour
market, often combining family responsibilities with part-time employment, they
looked to escape female work ghettos with poor career prospects and low pay by
retraining in new areas, and obtaining academic credentials. Others, already profes-
sionally qualified, used the OU to keep themselves intellectually active or updated
in their field while they took career breaks for family reasons. One of the first spe-
cial initiatives for women’s education in the OU was for women already qualified
in SET fields.
In the 1970s and 1980s the Open University had recruited women to its science
and technology courses in higher numbers than traditional universities. In the mid-
1980s women were 16% of all students on OU technology courses and 37% of
students on entry level Science courses. In 1980 Swarbrick established the first
Open University scheme, funded by the UK Manpower Services Commission, and
in partnership with Loughborough University, to prepare women qualified in en-
58 C. Herman et al.
gineering and technology, who had left paid employment for family reasons, to re-
turn to technological work. The programme was designed to promote confidence,
knowledge and skills in career planning, and broaden and update existing technical
knowledge. The programme included special counselling, a residential preparatory
weekend and a choice of studying from a wide range of distance learning courses
in technology subjects which could contribute towards a degree level qualification.
In the 1980s OU distance learning technologies included paper-based materials,
television and radio broadcasting, audio materials (on tape) and some computer-
based activities using networked teletype machines located in local study cen-
tres, supported by local tutors. Once they were all studying their mainstream SET
courses, students had little contact with each other. This isolation of pre-internet
distance education was a well-recognised problem, and a great deal of effort was
spent encouraging students to find ways to keep in contact with each other after
the residential experience.
Swarbrick and Chivers described the rationale for using distance education as
follows:
The retraining needs of experienced women engineers who wish to retrain and return to
work after several years at home are not necessarily the same as those of the young male
trainees who are normally found in college classes. There are problems of distance and
travel to college, lack of childcare facilities, inconvenient timetabling, apart from the inap-
propriateness of courses. (Swarbrick and Chivers 1985, unnumbered page)
Between 1982 and 1985, 118 women received bursaries and completed the pro-
gramme. Many returned to SET employment soon after the end of their studies
(Kirkup and Swarbrick 1986). The scheme was so successful that in 1985 it was
expanded to offer similar bursaries to women who wanted to enter science and
technology professions for the first time. Eventually changes in government fund-
ing meant that the scheme could no longer be funded because it did not fulfil new
criteria (Swarbrick 1986, 1987), and, like many an excellent gender equality proj-
ects, it ceased when its funding stopped. The success of the WITS scheme also
raised awareness of gender issues more widely within the Technology Faculty, and
the subsequent introduction of curriculum and pedagogical changes contributed to
an increase in the numbers of women students (Bissell et€al. 2003).
However, despite the success of programmes like WIT, there was a continued
problem of women’s representation in SET at a UK and international level dur-
ing this time as evidenced, for example, by the SIGIS report (Faulkner 2004). The
need for direct intervention to support women returners re-emerged on the political
agenda in the UK with the publication of the Maximising Returns report (People
Science Policy 2002) which highlighted the national importance of bringing women
back into SET employment. The subsequent setting up of the UK Resource Centre
for Women in SET in 2004, with the Open University as a core partner, provided the
resources to develop a new online course for women returners. Although the experi-
ence of the WIT scheme was an inspiration in formulating the new programme, it
was clear that there would be enormous advantage in delivering the course online,
making use of the most up-to-date learning technologies in order to attract a wider
audience.
5â•… Innovatory Educational Models for Women Returners 59
With public resources limited and subject to competition in their allocation, the
ability to act quickly to take advantage of external initiatives for women’s education
depends usually on the prior existence of an individual or a small group of gender
activists within an organisation. As part of the national Women into Science and
Engineering (WISE) campaign,2 a new activist group was created within the OU
which was subsequently able to support and promote WIT, and helped extend its
life. The group developed its own momentum, aiming to expand work on the par-
ticipation of women students and staff in SET subjects in the University.
The WISE group at the OU provided an interfaculty space for the development
of interdisciplinary perspectives and mutual networking and support. It worked on
the development of interdisciplinary Women’s and Gender Studies courses, creat-
ing strong critical analysis of gender, and inserting SET content into these courses
(Kirkup and Keller 1992). It supported research activity by group members on
women in SET fields, within and outside the OU (e.g. Carter and Kirkup 1991;
Whitelegg et€al. 2002; Donovan et€al. 2005; Ellen and Herman 2005), promoted
gender awareness of the needs of women students in the SET disciplines in the
University, and advised on the design of course materials. Members of the network
were also involved in external national initiatives and campaigning groups, such
as the Women’s Engineering Society, Women in Physics Group of the Institute of
Physics and the UK Association for Women in Science and Engineering (AWISE).
One aspect of the group’s power lay in the influence its members wielded in vari-
ous arenas including national campaigns that led to the creation of the UK Resource
Centre for Women in SET (UKRC).
Over time, membership of the OU group of activists changed. Some members re-
tired, or were pulled into working for other projects and new members joined who
had different experiences of working outside the University in women’s education
in SET. This changing body provided an underlying continuity, while being re-
energised with new people with new ideas. Several members of the OU network
were key in setting up the UKRC and the associated campaign which was launched
in 2004 to support women’s re-entry into SET employment and research careers
known as the RETURN Campaign. A key component of the national strategy was to
be a special initiative for women returners to SET, developed by the OU for online
2╇
WISE began in 1984 and was run by the Engineering Council and the UK Equal Opportunities
Commission to promote the participation of girls and women in SET education and careers. The
campaign still exists and continues to work particularly with schools on these issues.
60 C. Herman et al.
delivery: T1603. This was the first time such a scheme for returners had been offered
in such a format and on such a large scale, and it was intended to attract women who
were geographically isolated or unable to study at conventional institutions. At the
same time, with the unique tutorial structure of the Open University and additional
activities provided by the UKRC network of regional hubs based in Scotland, Wales
and three English regions, participants were able to benefit from localised support
in their own area. The possibilities of adding other kinds of networking in addition
to face-to-face meetings were much greater in this project than in the WIT scheme.
In order to meet the needs of women from a range of academic backgrounds, the
course was designed to offer a generic programme of personal and professional de-
velopment rather than trying to update specific technical knowledge or skills. How-
ever, the online nature of the course was also intended to be a vehicle for students
to renew and expand existing IT skills that would be of value in their subsequent
employment. The course was designed to run over a period of 10 weeks and to be
accessed via a dedicated website and online discussion areas. The learning out-
comes of the course illustrate the broad nature of the material covered. Participants
would: analyse their personal career and educational history, including the develop-
ment and updating of their CV; identify their professional skills and highlight their
training needs; explore the impact of gender in the workplace and develop skills
to increase employability, such as job searching, interview and negotiation skills,
networking and communication, as well as producing a career action plan.
Course materials were designed to help to address the barriers facing women
returners, with emphasis on the SET-specific issues. An important tool introduced
within the first week of the course is an electronic portfolio that enables women to
collect evidence of their achievements and collate paid and unpaid work experience,
including an evaluation of skills and abilities gained. This was found to be a valu-
able tool that could be taken away by students for use after the end of the course
(Herman and Kirkup 2008). Reflective activities that enable women to examine
critically their careers to date were built into early sessions of the course. For ex-
ample, a ‘lifeline activity’ requires students to reflect on their achievements as well
as the challenges in their lives by asking them to portray these as ‘highs and lows’
on a chart.
The course was designed to provide practical outcomes that would help move
women towards their stated goals. Two main outputs were included in the assess-
ment requirements that could be essential tools for future career development:
namely a CV and an action plan. The CV (or ‘résumé’) is checked and commented
on as part of the first course assessment, and feedback on it is incorporated into
a revised version submitted for final assessment. The action plan with clear time
limited goals provides a template for continued progress for 6 months beyond the
end of the course, and included a commitment to contact another student at the end
of this period.
All Open University courses are known by Faculty initials as part of a unique course code—in
3╇
With the support of national government and European funding, the course has
been free of charge to participants, including reimbursement of travel and childcare
expenses for attending two face-to-face tutorial sessions. While not all women have
attended these sessions, for many this opportunity to meet other women in similar
situations and to resume social networking in a professional capacity proved to be
important in regaining their confidence: this has been an important theme through-
out the course and in the subsequent support provided by the UKRC network of
regional hubs. This is underpinned in the course by material on networking that
explores how to make and maintain useful contacts, encouraging women to join
online networks to enhance their own sphere of influence. Additional face-to-face
networking events, held in conjunction with UKRC regional partners, have proved
very popular, offering women practical experience of networking in a formal pro-
fessional environment (including activities such as ‘speed networking’). The course
also features the stories of nine ‘role model’ women who have successfully returned
to work after their own career breaks, highlighting important personal issues such
as work–life balance. Indeed, the exploration of work–life balance is an important
theme throughout the course, and reflections by students on this topic highlight-
ed the difficulties they encountered in reconciling multiple roles (Herman 2006).
While the course aims to encourage and support these women in their return to
employment, it is also important to allow them to explore the difficulties they could
face both practically and emotionally in reconciling family and work commitments,
and to develop an understanding of how these conflicts can be shaped by gendered
assumptions about domestic and workplace roles.
Students use a range of online discussion forums to structure and carry out course
activities, creating a sense of intimacy and shared experience. The OU has had ex-
perience of using online group activities for learning since the late 1980s, and the
course team understood how to design online activities for maximum participation
(Salmon 2002). In addition, there is an online activity where guests from industry
and the research community are invited as ‘visiting experts’ to answer students’
questions over a two week period. Questions have ranged from specific issues about
working in particular academic and industrial sectors to more generic questions
about how to reconcile work and family life.
Collaboration between the OU and other UKRC partners has enabled the course
to be accompanied by a range of other support activities which added value: men-
toring; work placements; individual advice and guidance, and networking events
co-ordinated with the aid of a central database of returners held at the UKRC na-
tional headquarters. The significance of this integrated model was highlighted by
the external project evaluation report: ‘This coherence is innovative and significant
to the service user, who can expect support at several points during her preparation
and search for a return to SET employment’ (Webster 2007).
Mentoring has been one of the key support activities provided. Course partici-
pants register to have a one-to-one mentor or join a peer mentoring circle in which
they mutually support other women returners in the same situation as themselves,
meeting regularly as a group after their initial training from one of the mentor-
ing co-ordinators. Student feedback, which we discuss later, suggests that these
62 C. Herman et al.
local support networks are crucial for developing and building self-esteem as well
as contacts which are invaluable in seeking employment. Indeed, networking has
been a central component of the integrated model. While on the course, women are
encouraged to identify and join relevant networking organisations including profes-
sional institutes and learned societies, and national/international organisations and
groups supporting women in SET. The final component of the integrated model has
included the provision of work placements for some participants in order to give
them relevant up-to-date work experience.
Between 2005 and 2007 the T160 course had over 700 women participate in five
cohorts and has contributed significantly to the overall national objective of sup-
porting the return to work of women qualified in SET. Since 2008, after the initial
funding period elapsed, the course has been integrated into the OU’s mainstream
provision and continues to support about 100 returners per year.
An evaluation of the course and its impact on participants was conducted in 2007
involving three groups of students (458 participants). Data were collected from reg-
istration forms, an online survey (63% return rate) and a selected, representative
sample of 19 interviews (Dale et€al. 2007). The illustrative participant comments
used below are all taken from this evaluation.
Results indicate that difficulties and barriers are still likely to be encountered in
returning to work, and these are very similar to the barriers highlighted in the SET
Fair report (Greenfield 2002). Most of the participants had taken a career break,
usually, but not always, because of children. Their average age was 40 with most in
the age range 30–50 years. Most had been unemployed for over three years. Some
were ‘underemployed’ (i.e. working at a skill level below that of their qualifica-
tions and experience) or working in some other field in order to be able to have
local, flexible or part-time employment. They were all SET graduates with a range
of subject backgrounds—31% Physical Sciences and Mathematics, 23% Biology,
15% Computing and IT, 11% Engineering, with the rest having backgrounds in
specialised or inter-disciplinary fields. Difficulties and barriers to returning to work
were identified as:
• Lack of work experience (71%)
• Out-of-date skills (70%)
• Lack of confidence (57%)
• Lack of available work at an appropriate level (57%)
• Location of employers (51%)
• Lack of interview practice (49%)
• Lack of contacts (49%)
• Unavailability of part-time work (46%)
• Finding child care (26%)
5â•… Innovatory Educational Models for Women Returners 63
The majority of course participants said they were planning to return to work on
completion of the course, or in the near future. About a third wanted full-time em-
ployment, and about a quarter wanted part-time employment. A significant number
were exploring opportunities for self-employment and portfolio careers. More than
20% believed that they would require further training before they were likely to
be successful in their aspirations. Some women were hoping to use their scientific
and technical skills differently, perhaps as technical writers or scientific journal-
ists. Others, who were disenchanted with the culture of SET, both in academia and
industry, were seeking to take their SET qualifications and skills elsewhere. About
half expected to seek employment at a lower level than they had enjoyed before
they took a career break. A variety of reasons contributed to this expectation: many
felt the need for re-training and re-skilling before they could establish themselves
at the same level; many were looking for part-time work to start with; for some,
employment opportunities were location-limited; it was not clear how one might
change career, but immediately work at an equivalent level. Some women reported
experiences of having felt the need to ‘drop down a level’ and then having to deal
with resentment from bosses who felt intimidated because they were less qualified
than the returners.
Participants had three main objectives for studying the course:
• To help them return to paid work (66%)
• Personal development (54%)
• To help change career (37%)
More specifically they wanted to know about options open to them after their career
break, and needed to develop knowledge of, and confidence in, current recruitment
and selection procedures.
These objectives align with the purpose, design and learning outcomes of the
course, and most participants felt that their objectives for taking the course had
been met. When asked about the impact of the course on their lives, most com-
ments were extremely positive and emphasised the importance of the personal
development:
The course has enabled me to look at my needs and wants. It has made me aware of my
personal barriers to returning to a work environment and has started me looking at ways I
can overcome them. (IT graduate, 48 years old)
Most participants were very positive about the impact of the course on their skills,
confidence and future prospects. The emphasis and support in developing a CV was
universally appreciated, and doing company research was felt to be really useful.
An improved CV, in particular, had boosted their confidence in their future careers.
‘I feel more confident…that I have better career prospects’ (Technician, 27 years
old). ‘It really helped to see longer-term and has given me more confidence.’ (IT
graduate, 49 years old)
For some the experience bore immediate fruit:
I got a job and am so happy! I would not have applied for the job without T160 guiding my
thoughts and motivating me. It also gave me the confidence to apply high and now I realise
64 C. Herman et al.
that it was not beyond my capabilities, also, and I would have had a much less impressive
CV and cover letter without the course. (Psychologist, 36 years old).
The online networking aspects of the course were perceived as valuable by many:
I am very happy I took this course. I am very aware now that I am not the only SET trained
woman who is not employed. It has also given me the opportunity to form a network.
(Chemist, 28 years old)
Some would have liked more opportunity for face-to-face networking on a more
local basis, or continued contact within the framework set up by the course. A few
participants, however, did not fully grasp the nature of an online course, and they
missed out on electronic networking possibilities. Because T160 is a relatively short
course, some participants only understood the nature of the online communication
possibilities too late in the course to benefit greatly.
One part of the course focussed on structural gender-based barriers to employ-
ment in SET. Many found this helpful as they realised that their lack of success in
finding career paths to return to was often due to structural and institutional rather
than personal factors. The converse of this was that some participants felt disheart-
ened and discouraged by the analysis of institutional discrimination. The course
tried to mitigate this anticipated feeling of disempowerment. A theoretical gender
perspective encouraged the sharing of experiences of dealing with gender issues in
a work environment.
Those participants who had started with the objective of returning to work or
changing career had not necessarily been able to do so within the short time-frame
of the course, but they did feel well prepared to go forward. They had developed
five-year goals and action plans and written inspiring, but realistic visions. They
had re-examined their goals, their achievements and their skills. They described
having clearer objectives, greater focus and were often much more optimistic: in-
deed many had now changed their plans.
…the course has made me examine my motives, and I’ve altered my objectives. I am much
clearer in my own mind. (Geologist, 51 years old)
…spending time focussing properly on the thought of returning to work instead of just
thinking about it in passing…. I have reconsidered my original career which I had previ-
ously dismissed the idea of returning to. (Chemist, 49 years old)
…to be honest my life is now changing completely – sometimes I can’t believe it! (Techni-
cian engineer, 40 years old)
Inevitably, the balance the course took in addressing issues did not suit everyone.
Some participants felt that there was too much emphasis on the needs of women
returners with children and insufficient attention given to issues of location, age
and updating of skills. Career breaks happen for many reasons, some from choice,
others not. There was also concern that the course was not challenging enough for
highly qualified women. A short course like this cannot address, in equal measure,
all the barriers facing these women. However, our data suggest that it has been suc-
cessful in supporting women to develop confidence, improve their career focus and
5â•… Innovatory Educational Models for Women Returners 65
initiate action. It has enabled participants to up-date some general skills and help
them assess the need for further training. It has facilitated the formation of personal
networks and, through the wider RETURN campaign of the UKRC, introduced par-
ticipants to existing support networks. It has enabled some to experience individual
mentoring and national peer mentoring circles, and to access work placement and
‘returner’ fellowship schemes.
There are five interesting lessons for other projects in women’s education that
come out of this one. These are to do with: distributed learning course design; inter-
organisational partnerships for educational provision; the importance of buy-in and
leadership from the top in organisations in order to achieve culture change; the im-
portance of internal, informal networks of gender activists; the impact on women’s
identities of provision and support for women ‘returners’.
The feedback from participants and the high level of positive outcomes (over
300 out of the original 700 are known to have gone on to employment or further
study at the time of writing) show that an online course, plus integrated local sup-
port, can offer a successful model for the re-integration of women returners follow-
ing a career break. This course confirms the experience that distance education can
be accessible, flexible and the preferred mode of€formal education for retraining to
return to work, or for developing the careers of many adult women. While similar
resources may not be easily available to small education and training providers, it
is clear that more extensive use can be made of online tools for developing sup-
portive networks by those who design courses for adult women. Extensive use of
the internet among women in the developed world makes it easier to use online
social networking tools to build communities for women who are geographically
isolated, or working in the domestic environment, and this does not necessarily
incur expensive infrastructure development. The particular online and distributed
pedagogical model that this course has adopted has enabled students to draw on na-
tional resources and networks while being very involved with local support activity,
developing local knowledge and networking.
The individual responses of the women who were supported through the RE-
TURN campaign, including the T160 course, indicate that these women were able
to (re)-identify themselves as scientists and engineers, while envisaging and relo-
cating themselves in the current SET employment landscape. Engagement with a
group of women in very similar positions allowed them time to reflect on and plan
for their future careers. Having direct access to role models and mentoring, to many
different networks and to a variety of support services, at national and local level, all
contributed to a sense of progress and change of direction with which these women
felt confident and comfortable. Their experiences should contribute to and enhance
the services and support available for future returners, and perhaps also influence
the SET employment climate.
66 C. Herman et al.
This integrated model of support provided by the OU and the network of UKRC
partners, within the context of a strong commitment to collaboration and partner-
ship, has been vital to the success of the course at a national level. Being both na-
tional and local, it draws on the strengths of both, and is likely therefore to be more
robust than the local courses that we have been more familiar with in the past. While
small organisations and community education providers may not have access to
national level partners, the networking capacities of the internet would also enable
a consortium of small providers to create, at a more local level, something similar
to the course and partnership we have described here.
Working in partnership with a national organisation, such as the UKRC in this
instance, enabled access to influential policymakers, professional bodies and senior
managers in SET industries. Changes to culture and working practices will only
take place if those in high level positions proactively support change, so oppor-
tunities provided by access to such people of influence are an important factor in
achieving progress for women’s career development in SET employment.
Our experience is an example of the importance of the development of informal
networks of gender activists in educational institutions. New methods of online
networking might make it possible to strengthen these networks and keep them live
during quiet/inactive periods. We suggest that universities and further education
colleges, for example, should actively support informal internal networks of staff
with a particular interest in women’s education, and allow space for their activities.
Such networks usually ask for very little in the way of institutional resources: they
rely mainly on the small amounts of time members give to them. However, these
networks provide the institution with the capacity to bid for funding when special
initiatives for women are announced. They provide a location for external parties to
make contact with for future projects. They provide the support base that individual
innovators need if their projects are to be sustainable. They also provide continuity
between different funded projects because in the gender field we are used to spo-
radic funding and periods of scarce resources.
The particular issues faced by women in SET continue to be significant despite
many years of policies, interventions and initiatives. Wider social and cultural
issues continue to play an important role, and despite good intentions there is
no ‘once and for all’ educational solution to the ‘leaky pipeline’ in SET. For the
foreseeable future, women’s careers will involve time away from employment
as women still take primary responsibility for childcare and family work. Con-
sequently, there will continue to be a need for special educational initiatives to
help women return to SET employment after a career break, to allow both them
and the State to take advantage of the previous investment in their education and
skills. However, employers and policymakers must ensure that educational activ-
ity is combined with changes to workplace practices and culture which will enable
retention and progression for women in their careers. A closer partnership between
educational providers, employers and professional organisations could ensure the
availability of re-training and part-time working opportunities at all levels of a
career.
5â•… Innovatory Educational Models for Women Returners 67
Acknowledgements╇ The T160 Course and associated services for women returners described
here have been funded by the European Social Fund (ESF) Equal Programme and the UK Govern-
ment’s Department for Trade and Industry (DTI) through the UK Resource Centre for Women in
SET. We are grateful to the women who participated in the T160 course with such enthusiasm, and
who shared their stories with us; to the course team; tutors; evaluators and colleagues from the UK
Resource Centre for Women in SET, as well as other networks for women in SET who contributed
to the success of the course.
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Chapter 6
Women’s Choices Shattered: Impact of Gender
Violence on Universities
Esther Oliver
Introduction
Different expressions of violence in our societies affect women. This chapter analy-
ses the way in which violence occurs in universities. Forms of misogyny and dis-
crimination encountered by female academics and students are translated into bar-
riers which hamper their educational and professional plans, affecting their lifelong
learning processes and having an impact on their lives. The evidence presented in
this chapter is obtained from academic literature in the field and from the voices of
research participants. Those who took part in the research are mainly involved in
dealing with this issue in UK universities. The data point to two different types of
findings. First, that the university is still a male-dominated domain in which differ-
ent forms of misogyny and discrimination occur, affecting female academics and
students. Second, in this context, different forms of violence become barriers which
have a negative impact on the educational and professional plans of some women
and, by extension, on their lives in society as a whole. This chapter contributes to-
wards breaking down the stereotype view that only some specific groups of women
are affected by this problem. On the contrary, this problem can affect both female
students and staff, since violence against women crosses as many boundaries in the
academic field as it does in society as a whole.
In order to understand the wider concept of violence against women, a good
place to start is with the definition contained in the Declaration on the Elimination
of Violence against Women (United Nations 1993), which was established in the UN
General Assembly resolution 48/104 of the 20th of December 1993:
For the purposes of this Declaration, the term ‘violence against women’ means any act of
gender-based violence that results in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or psycho-
logical harm or suffering to women, including threats of such acts, coercion or arbitrary
deprivation of liberty, whether occurring in public or in private life. (Article 1)
E. Oliver ()
Department of Sociological Theory, University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
e-mail: estoliver@googlemail.com
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 69
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_6, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
70 E. Oliver
The definition of violence in this declaration includes the physical, sexual and psy-
chological violence which occurs within the family, in the general community and
which is perpetrated or condoned by the State.
I will first discuss more detailed definitions provided by several authors of the
diverse forms of this phenomenon within the university context. Fitzgerald et€al.
(1988), for example, created a research tool entitled The Sexual Experience Ques-
tionnaire (SEQ), which aimed to facilitate comparative results and to reach a com-
mon definition of what sexual harassment is. Their definition of sexual harassment,
based on Till’s categories (Till 1980), is considered to be one of the most commonly
used definitions for research in this field (Toffey Shepela and Levesque 1998; Kalof
et€al. 2001). Fitzgerald et€al. (1988, p.€157) identified five general areas of sexual
harassment: gender harassment (generalised sexist remarks and behaviour); seduc-
tive behaviour (inappropriate and offensive, but essentially sanction-free, sexual
advances); sexual bribery (solicitation of sexual activity or other sexually related
behaviour based on a promise of rewards); sexual coercion (coercion of sexual
activity based on a threat of punishment); sexual assault (gross sexual imposition
or assault). The later work of Kalof et€al. (2001) indicates how this typology was
revised to incorporate a new concept. These authors argued that sexual harassment
is a behavioural construct consisting of three separate dimensions: gender harass-
ment (including verbal and nonverbal behaviour which does not aim for sexual
cooperation, but conveys degrading, hostile or insulting attitudes); unwanted sexual
attention (this consists of verbal and nonverbal behaviour such as repeated request
for dates, intrusive letters and phone calls, touching, grabbing and gross sexual
imposition or assault) and sexual coercion (which consists of unwanted sexual at-
tention linked to job- or course-related losses or benefits which are either explicit or
implied and consist of bribes or threats to achieve sexual cooperation) (Kalof et€al.
2001, p.€285).
Drawing on this broad concept of violence against women suggests there is a
need to analyse the structures of power relationships which still prevail in univer-
sity contexts. Indeed, understanding these structures can contribute towards clari-
fying why some circumstances favour contexts which are prone to the emergence
of gender violence. According to Osborne (1995), it is related to maintaining male
privileges, social control, silencing women, and gender domination in academia.
Furthermore, other research specifically highlights the negative effects that unequal
conceptualizations of gender relationships can have in actually generating violent
conduct (Bondurant 2001).
The research presented in this chapter is linked to the research framework de-
veloped by Safo CREA’s1 Women’s Group,2 which stresses the need to go deeper
into the study of the different forms of violence which affect all kinds of women
in today’s societies. This group also stresses the importance of the analysis of new
forms of masculinity which can contribute towards overcoming this violence.
1╇
CREA is the Centre of Research in Theories and Practices that Overcome Inequalities, at the
University of Barcelona.
2╇
http://www.pcb.ub.es/crea/en/gdona_en.htm.
6â•… Women’s Choices Shattered 71
3╇
http://www.ub.es/includ-ed/.
72 E. Oliver
and (2) the elements which can contribute to overcoming all forms of violence
against women within this context.
In this chapter I will specifically explore the data related to the way in which the
barriers identified are an expression of the fact that universities are still male-dom-
inated domains which allow different forms of misogyny or discrimination against
women to occur. Each section of this chapter combines references to the academic
literature with quotations from my fieldwork. The first section describes another
side of the university context, which contains complex hierarchical barriers and
power relationships, favouring the development of attitudes of hostility to women,
such as different forms of sexual harassment. The argument in the second section of
this chapter is focused on exploring how these barriers have an impact on the way
in which female students experience their educational paths, or on the way in which
female academics develop their professional plans. Finally, I will highlight new
insights about this phenomenon.
Statistical data show that the level of violence against women in society as a whole
is reflected in violence at universities. The campaign launched by the Council of
Europe in 2006, entitled Stop domestic violence against women, maintained that
one-fifth to one-quarter of all women have experienced physical violence at least
once during their adult lives, and more than one-tenth have suffered sexual violence
involving the use of force. Secondary data provided by this campaign also indicate
that about 12–15% of all women have been in a relationship involving domestic
abuse after the age of 16.4
The figures available from different research projects, mainly carried out in non-
European countries, and which specifically focus on the university context, also
demonstrate high rates of the different forms of violence suffered by college women
(both students and faculty staff) and perpetrated by dating partners, boyfriends or
professors in universities. Gross et€al. (2006), for example, based their study on a
sample of 935 undergraduate female college students and demonstrated that 27.2%
of women report that they faced unwanted sexual experiences after enrolling in
college. Kalof et€ al. (2001) also indicated that women are victims of sexual ha-
rassment perpetrated by college professors and instructors. Out of a sample of 525
undergraduates, they found that 40% of the women and 28.7% of the men had been
sexually harassed by male faculty members. Both studies were conducted in the
United States.
However, very little detailed research evidence is available about the way in
which this violence affects female academics and students in European universi-
ties. One such research project is an I+D+I (Research and Development) project
http://www.coe.int/t/dg2/equality/domesticviolencecampaign/source/PDF_FS_Violence_
4╇
Campaign_E.pdf.
6â•… Women’s Choices Shattered 73
Female staff and female students come across different types of barriers when they
are confronted by sexual harassment within the university context. The analysis of
these barriers points to the fact that few of these cases are reported and to the need
for a better definition of effective responses to combat sexual harassment within ac-
ademic contexts. In this section, I will provide some evidence of these constraints.
First, universities are still male-dominated institutions which contain complex
hierarchical and power relationships. Grauerholz (1996), for example, explains how
some universities are embedded in institutional and social structures that make it
difficult for women to report encounters of abusive situations. This author points
out the hierarchical nature of universities which still place men in authoritarian and
powerful positions and increases the vulnerability of women. This can be increased,
for example, when most of the governing bodies and managerial structures are still
male-dominated, as several research participants highlighted:
Particularly in this university […] which is, as you know, further behind other universities,
it is still very traditional and generally very male-dominated, so it is important that […] sev-
eral campaigns, such as a kind of raising of awareness or a specific thing […]. (Participant
in a daily-life story no.€3)
Dziech and Weiner (1990) mention other reasons why women in universities are
more vulnerable such as the hazy institutional authority in universities, the tempo-
rariness of the academic positions many women hold and the academic conserva-
5╇
This research was directed by Dr. Rosa Valls, professor at the University of Barcelona. Her
research team is composed of members of seven Spanish universities: http://www.pcb.ub.es/crea/
proyectos/violencia/index.htm.
74 E. Oliver
tism which still prevails in these institutions. They also mention the huge resistance
to change, the distribution of power and the fact that the institutional changes which
are promoted are so slow.
Jocey Quinn also analysed the unequal distribution of power between men and
women in universities through an international research project consisting of in-
depth interviews with women working in universities in different countries. She
states: ‘It was rare for women to reach the highest positions in their universities
and those who had more power were scarcely feminist. Women struggled to gain
representation on decision-making committees, and once there, they were made to
feel invisible and even ridiculous’ (Quinn 2003, p.€26).
According to the indicators for ‘Women and Science’6 created by the European
Commission (1999), ‘the feminisation ratio amongst senior academic staff’ (grade
A), between 1998 and 2002 in the EU-25 level7 moved from 14.0% in 1998 to
16.4% in 2002. However, the percentage of women in the most senior positions is
still very low: the distribution of women amongst academic staff by grade was 14%
for grade A (more senior positions) and 41% for grade D (less senior positions) in
the EU-25. At a UK8 level, this distribution between women in universities is simi-
lar (14% for grade A and 46% for grade D).
Second, some circumstances create an adverse environment for women in some
academic contexts which makes it difficult for them to break the silence which sur-
rounds sexual harassment when it happens (Benson and Thomson 1982; Fitzgerald
et€al. 1988; Dziech and Weiner 1990; Osborne 1995). Osborne (1995), for example,
mentions the existence of a chilly climate in her study which she carried out in a Ca-
nadian university. She demonstrates the devaluation and marginalisation of women
in some university contexts reflected by the curricula, or through the use of sexual
and racist stereotypes in class.
Gross et€al. (2006) also mention the impact of sexist stereotypes on the attitudes
and beliefs of college men and women, for example, those which associate rape
with physical force, violence and with completed intercourse. According to these
authors, these situations mean that some of the sexual harassment suffered by wom-
en in universities is not labelled or reported, because it is regarded as acceptable.
This adverse environment for women is also evident in the hostility or the lack
of response from some institutions when women decide to complain or to report the
harassment they have experienced. Some research participants, for example, stress
the lack of effective responses to some cases:
[…] two years ago a female student in a college was attacked late at night by another male
student, and she has marks on her body […] she went to talk to somebody in her college
6╇
http://ec.europa.eu/research/science-society/women/wssi/downindi_en.html#As.
7╇
The following countries are included in the label EU-25: Austria, Belgium Flemish speaking
community, Belgium French speaking community, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Germany, Denmark,
Estonia, Greece, Spain, Finland, France, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Latvia,
Malta, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Sweden, Slovenia, Slovakia, United Kingdom.
8╇
http://ec.europa.eu/research/science-society/women/wssi/pdf/10_academicstaff_grade.pdf.
6â•… Women’s Choices Shattered 75
about the situation […], but [the attitude was] there is nothing we can do at all. (Participant
in a daily-life story no.€4)
We hear about staff who say, who feel very hopeless and say, even if I had made a com-
plaint, […] I don’t believe that things will get better as a result of complaining. (Interviewed
person no.€6)
Wagner and Magnusson (2005), identify strategies within some higher education
institutions aimed at silencing women academics who have been victims of sexual
harassment: these include stigmatization or indifferent attitudes in response to their
experiences. The same attempts to silence women were also highlighted by partici-
pants in my research:
You try to go on with things and move forward and you go to sit in the bar, and that person
is there and she told her tutor that and her tutor said: oh you should probably not go to the
bar then, and that was the attitude, which is absolutely ridiculous […]. (Participant in a
daily-life story no.€3)
A similar feeling is found when women have to face mistrust from others, or are
considered trouble-makers or to be partly responsible for what happened. The prob-
lem identified above is compounded for the complainant by the punitive reaction
transmitted by the institution to some women who decide to complain:
[…] so I mean in this particular case a woman made a complaint about harassment [in her
university], […] and she put in this complaint and described what was happening […] if
she complains of being harassed, she is punished for complaining […]. (Participant in a
daily-life story no.€3)
There are many indications of the pressure on some women to remain invisible
within academia. In one of the few studies found on this topic carried out in the UK,
for example, Thomas (2004) argues that effective responses to sexual harassment in
universities should not be taken for granted even when sexual harassment policies
or equal opportunity policies are implemented. In addition, Eyre (2000) argues that
some university environments create conditions under which some forms of sexual
harassment are naturalised by the dominant discourse, even amongst feminist aca-
demics.
Specifically, the lack of support and solidarity between female academics and
students is another barrier to overcoming abusive situations for women in aca-
demia (Benson and Thomson 1982; Dziech and Weiner 1990; Cowan 2000; Eyre
2000). Cowan (2000), for example, analyses the way in which the lack of solidar-
ity between female students contributes to increasing and reproducing a climate
of hostility amongst women in universities. She studies the way in which women
can contribute towards the perpetuation of sexual violence when they support the
idea of blaming the victims. Cowan concludes that these women’s hostility towards
other women may impede women’s participation in the movement against gender
violence. On the other hand, Benson and Thomson (1982) indicate that this lack
of solidarity can also be found within the female academic community, amongst
themselves or directed at female students, when they ignore or do not support other
women who are in a more vulnerable situation.
76 E. Oliver
This lack of solidarity amongst women in some academic contexts was high-
lighted in my own research data:
I think there should be more women in the policies and in the procedures for female solidar-
ity […] quite a lot of women don’t support each other because then they will be attached to
being involved with sexual harassment because it damages their career. So there is a divi-
sion […] because it affects your own life and your own career. (Participant in a daily-life
story no.€6)
Based on these contributions, it can be clearly observed that different forms of vio-
lence against women affect academic women and female students, and that the uni-
versity is not immune from such violence which is prevalent in our wider society.
To summarize:
• Universities are still mainly male domains and contain complex and hierarchi-
cal power relationships which make it difficult for violence against women to
receive appropriate acknowledgement. Such circumstances can increase the vul-
nerability of some women, mainly those who face abusive situations.
• Some of the barriers that women come across in these environments hinder
women’s opportunity to break the silence and to become more visible when they
have experienced abuse.
When analysing the forms of discrimination and barriers which affect the social,
educational and economic development of women, it is very important to take ac-
count of misogyny in the wider society. Behind the difficulties that some women
experience, many academic studies reveal behaviour, attitudes and values involving
scorn, discrimination or the sexual abuse of women, also within university contexts
(Burt 1980; Dziech and Weiner 1990; Reilly et€al. 1992; Stombler 1994; Ayres Bo-
swell and Spade 1996; Boeringer 1999).
This hostility towards women is discovered in some social contexts which pro-
mote it in many different forms (Forbes et€al. 2006). Some authors establish a clear
connection between certain beliefs and the development of behaviour linked to
sexual harassment and assault (Reilly et€ al. 1992). Based on a study containing
a sample of 920 students (534 college women and 386 college men), Reilly et€al.
found significant positive correlations between men’s self-reported tolerance for
sexual harassment, adversarial sexual beliefs, rape-myth acceptance and the likeli-
hood to rape or be a sexual victimiser. This is referred to as continuum of misogyny.
This underpins the treatment of academic women by male peers or male faculty
members in some universities. The emphasis on women’s submission in certain so-
cialisation processes (Yancey and Hummer 1989; Kalof 1993; Stombler 1994) and
on female subordination in patriarchal societies (Dziech and Weiner 1990) and its
institutions (such as universities) can also contribute towards explaining it. Stalker
6â•… Women’s Choices Shattered 77
(2001) establishes a link between the misogyny which still exists in societies today
and the barriers that women face during their participation in education. The ex-
pectations of women, and of what their role in families should be, increase social
pressure on them when they decide to continue their education. This pressure is an
added barrier to their learning process and sometimes translates into disillusion-
ment and failure. The main barriers to women’s educational and professional plans
identified in this study can be divided between those which have an impact on their
personal and emotional lives and those which have a direct impact on their educa-
tional and professional plans.
Regarding the barriers which have an impact on the personal and emotional lives
of women, one difficulty which has been highlighted in academic literature and in
testimonies collected in my own empirical research is the low rates of reporting
abuse. In many cases women affected suffer from isolation and do not report their
aggressors (Dziech and Weiner 1990; Stombler 1994). Research participants also
stress the difficulties that some female students have when coming to terms with the
situation they have experienced:
Some students deal with it by pretending it doesn’t happen. I know a couple of cases, I am
going to put it in a box and I am going to continue my studies while I am here, and although
I always told them to go to a counsellor, it is very much their choice how to deal with the
event or the incident. (E02: Interviewed person no.€2)
This lack of reporting and silence is accompanied in some cases by different feel-
ings, identified as a deep sense of shame, a decrease in emotional stability, an in-
creasing tendency to blame themselves, an extended belief that harassment is in-
evitable, a lowering of self-esteem and a negative impact on the personal growth
process (Benson and Thomson 1982; Marks and Nelson 1993; Eyre 2000; Wagner
and Magnusson 2005). One of the research participants also explained her percep-
tion of the impact harassment can have on women:
Someone who is psychologically undermining you, telling you are rubbish, putting you
down, being horrible to you and at the same time, there is any tendency you might have […]
I have done something wrong, this is my fault […]. (Interviewed person no.€4)
Some women also develop a fear of reprisals by male peers or male supervisors if
they finally decide to report the aggressor. These fears become even greater when
women perceive that the structures of power in universities favour an environment
in which sexual harassment is tolerated and not condemned:
She decided she didn’t want to go to the police because it can be a long case, and they live in
the same college together […] so they possibly meet on a daily basis because each college
has one-hundred students (approximately), and she was very concerned about the social
stigma and she decided not to do anything. (Participant in a daily-life story no.€4)
Certain authors also highlight the fear of being considered a trouble-maker or the
potential effect reporting someone could have on women’s careers and a concern for
their reputation within organisations (Toffey Shepela and Levesque 1998). These
authors point to such issues as factors which influence women’s decisions not to
report instances of sexual harassment. In addition, Dziech and Weiner (1990) write
that the key to understanding women’s responses to harassment is to be found in the
78 E. Oliver
education and socialisation of some women into certain kinds of gender identities
which can increase their vulnerability. At the same time, and according to the argu-
ment presented at the beginning of this section, the socialisation processes experi-
enced by some men, which are rooted in misogynistic values, can also have a deep
effect on increasing women’s vulnerability.
As a result of the lack of an effective response by universities to cases of sexual
harassment, and also as a consequence of the harmful effects that these situations of
abuse have on them, some women are disappointed by the approach taken. This has
an impact on their educational and professional plans. Some develop negative opin-
ions and perceptions of the university as an institution and of male academics as
professionals (Marks and Nelson 1993), or they lose confidence in the effectiveness
of the sexual harassment policies which are implemented in universities (Thomas
2004). Some women might also develop (or increase) a feeling of mistrust in their
relationships with the opposite sex, and sometimes adopt strategies to reduce their
chances of encountering the perpetrators (Benson and Thomson 1982; Reilly et€al.
1986).
However, the strategies to avoid potential situations of harassment become ex-
tremely difficult when male faculty members or professors are the aggressors and
college women are the victims. This is because female students are in a subor-
dinate position, or because female academics are less powerful than senior male
colleagues. Participants in the field work explained specific circumstances which
complicate this situation:
[…] when you are doing a dissertation on a particular piece of romantic poetry, a very spe-
cialised dissertation, and you got a supervisor who is the unique specialist in this area, and
then you have one-on-one supervision with this person you know, every couple of months,
or every month, and then there is a problem now […] a harassment problem or even other
kinds of problems, but then it is pretty much impossible to get another supervisor and so,
this is kind of the problem with the supervisor relationship […]. (Participant in a daily-life
story no.€3)
Another type of negative impact which particularly affects women who have been
sexually abused or harassed is a decrease in the quality of their work. Some of them
lose confidence in their own work and in some cases they reduce the effort they de-
vote to it (Reilly et€al. 1986; Fitzgerald et€al. 1988). Consequently, these situations
make it more difficult for women to develop the ability to learn to their full potential
(Wagner and Magnusson 2005). It affects their self-esteem and increases the pos-
sibility that they will decide to give up their commitment to their careers in male-
dominated academic areas (Benson and Thomson 1982). Indeed, these analyses
make it explicit that sexual harassment is a form of sexism which interferes with the
ability of women to get an education or undertake a job (Dziech and Weiner 1990).
Some women’s choices are influenced to the extent that some of them decide to
stop attending classes at university, or to drop out of a course in order not to come
across the perpetrator again. This happens when universities have not developed
effective measures to penalise male academics who are the perpetrators of sexual
harassment. For the same reason, some women decide to change their advisor or pro-
fessor or give up their academic careers in male-dominated areas. In the most severe
6â•… Women’s Choices Shattered 79
cases, a few women decide to withdraw from university (Reilly et€al. 1986; Fitzger-
ald et€al. 1988; Dziech and Weiner 1990; Marks and Nelson 1993; Toffey Shepela
and Levesque 1998). This issue emerged in the data collected for the present study:
I think there are plenty of people for whom the stress […] is the result of some form of
harassment. Occasionally, we hear that people have decided to leave university as a result
of this. We have got some evidence that people respond by being ill and not coming to
work, or just by low levels of work, […] if people feel that they cannot complain, they get
trapped in a situation […]. Evidence from individual cases that have come to the harass-
ment network. (Interviewed people no.€6)
Sexual harassment not only affects female students, but also female professors and
staff. Farley (1978) carried out a study of sexual harassment in jobs which affected
women in the 1970s. Amongst the cases she explored, she included some illustra-
tive quotes which reflected the effect that harassment by superiors had on academic
women:
I hadn’t been teaching that long when the dean of my college was all over me for sex. He
was terribly insistent and I repeatedly refused. The next thing I know he suspended me from
teaching; of course, he gave me all sorts of other reasons. I couldn’t believe what was hap-
pening. Can you imagine when the dean is saying all these terrible things? […] Even if you
win it presents a terrible image. (Farley 1978, p.€109)
Although there are some 30 years between Farley’s investigation and my own study,
interview data suggested that this problem persists. One research participant warned
of the fears some people had of jeopardising their own careers if they go ahead with
reporting someone after being harassed or bullied:
People are very scared to come forward because they think by coming forward they will
jeopardise their careers. […] It can happen in a very subtle way […] I am going to give you
a bad reference. (E04: Interviewed person no.€4)
Finally, it is also relevant to take into account that the impact of sexual harassment
in universities affects not only the lives and educational and professional plans of
the women who are victims of it, but also the professional and personal lives of the
people who support them. Dziech and Weiner (1990), for example, describe the
way in which sexism on campus creates a second order of sexual harassment vic-
tims: those who advise, support, and rule in favour of the primary victims. Indeed,
the people who become involved in the situation of women who have experienced
sexual violence, who express solidarity towards them, and help to change this situ-
ation in universities can also be affected by large social and institutional pressure,
or by reprisals.
Recommendations
The initial findings, supported by an analysis of the literature and of my own data,
suggest the need for further research. There is a need to analyse violence against
women, not as something which affects individual women, but as a collective prob-
80 E. Oliver
lem which needs to be addressed by the actual university structures (Stombler 1994;
Grauerholz et€al. 1999; Wagner and Magnusson 2005). On some occasions, mea-
sures oriented towards solving these situations have been focused on individual
victims of sexual harassment in order to analyse their particular circumstances and
to explain why it has happened to them. However, international research stresses the
shortcomings of such an individualistic perspective and the need to analyse the phe-
nomenon in a way that takes into account its origins in social institutionalisation.
The tacit acceptance of violence is rooted in beliefs and in value systems which are
embedded in models of hegemonic masculinity which undervalue women. There-
fore, new insights should emphasise the problem at an institutional level (Reilly
et€al. 1986; Nicholson et€al. 1998).
There is also a need to analyse ways and define methods to overcome hostility
towards women in universities (Toffey Shepela and Levesque 1998; Grauerholz
et€al. 1999). In that sense, research efforts are required to analyse ways to promote
non-acceptance of sexual harassment and to transform university environments
which are hostile to women into supportive, egalitarian and dialogic spaces (Ayres
Boswell and Spade 1996; Potter et€al. 2000). The main aim of these new insights
should be to promote a change in the ideas which undervalue the perception of
women in sexual and affective relationships, and to promote reflection on the con-
sequences of unhealthy sexual and affective relationships (Charkow and Nelson
2000). More effort should be made to intervene in the social dynamic of universi-
ties and in the way social structures impact on gender relations (Ayres Boswell and
Spade 1996; Grauerholz et€al. 1999; Eyre 2000; Wagner and Magnusson 2005). One
of the ways to do that is by developing more supportive environments for women.
Educational interventions can be an effective way to encourage a change in at-
titudes and values related to forms of violence against women (Fonow et€al. 1992;
Reilly et€al. 1992; Ayres Boswell and Spade 1996; Toffey Shepela and Levesque
1998; Potter et€al. 2000; Gross et€al. 2006). Moreover, educational efforts can in-
crease women’s awareness of the potential for victimisation in some intimate situ-
ations with acquaintances or dating partners (Reilly et€al. 1992). These educational
efforts can contribute towards promoting reflection on the role of communication in
changing sexual relationships and on the role of power and myths in sexual assaults
(Potter et€al. 2000). Research findings also suggest the need to further explore and
start working on the preventive socialisation of gender violence at early educational
stages, in order to prevent sexual harassment of children and teenagers before it
begins (Gómez 2004; Valls et€al. 2008).
Further recommendations, stemming from the main points in this section, relate
to the need to analyse ways to improve the recruitment of female faculty members
in different positions, at every level of the hierarchical structures in universities
(Grauerholz 1996). It is important to guarantee the presence of female faculty mem-
bers at every level in order to make universities more hospitable environments for
women (Osborne 1995). In addition, increasing the presence of female students in
every department, including those such as engineering that are currently male domi-
nated, may be a way to promote their transformation into study environments which
are free of gender discrimination.
6â•… Women’s Choices Shattered 81
Finally, Thomas (2004) suggests the need to carry out a systematic evaluation
of the impact of sexual harassment policies implemented in universities in order to
progress towards creating effective responses. Feedback from these evaluation pro-
cedures can provide important clues to help guarantee that the measures undertaken
have a significant impact on overcoming this problem.
In developing mechanisms for support and solidarity among women, I would
like to stress the significance of informal networks of women when facing diffi-
culties and obstacles to reporting someone (Grauerholz et€al. 1999; Banyard et€al.
2005). Equally significant is the promotion of informal networks of solidarity
amongst women to support those who have experienced sexual harassment, in order
to complement the formal structures defined by universities for complaints (Grauer-
holz et€al. 1999). These types of networks, based on the positive impact of feminist
interaction, can draw on more collaborative relationships. They can also be founded
on friendship and relationships involving trust, and can overcome some of the con-
straints to reporting or making a formal complaint.
Conclusions
Evidence obtained from academic literature and qualitative data shows that some
universities are still male-dominated domains in which there are many barriers af-
fecting mainly women. One of these barriers is the existence of different forms of
gender violence. The basis of these findings is a broad definition of violence against
women which includes not only physical violence, but also sexist attitudes and
comments, different forms of scorn, sexual coercion, harassment or sexual assault.
This is a wide concept which suggests the need to examine male power structures
in universities and their impact on contexts which can favour situations involving
gender discrimination or gender violence.
Despite the limitations of research published at a European level on this topic,
international research (mainly from the United States) provides significant data on
the rates of violence against academic women (both students and faculty members).
These studies indicate that more knowledge is needed in order to understand better
how this phenomenon emerges in universities.
To conclude, I would like to stress the impact that the prevalence of forms of
gender discrimination in the university context has in society as a whole. Sexual
harassment or violence against women is related to social institutionalisation and
the acceptance of practices rooted in a system of beliefs and values which are
embedded in the models of hegemonic masculinity which persist in our societies
and which undermine women. The prevalence of these situations in universities
can have a deep impact on the lifelong learning processes of women, on the op-
portunities for women to have a successful academic career and to obtain a good
quality job. Consequently, this problem is a clear indication of the work that still
needs to be done in order to achieve full equality between men and women in our
societies.
82 E. Oliver
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Chapter 7
Part I: Conclusion
The work in the present section of the book can be located in a tradition of women’s
learning that draws on feminist principles and pedagogies to empower women in
seeking non-gendered choices. Women’s learning through shared experience and
networking, which is an important focus in the chapters above, emerges as a theme
that resonates in discussions of work and identity in subsequent sections of the
book. In Chap.€6 Olivier reveals the crucial role played by solidarity among women
to support those affected by gender violence. Networking and sharing experience
emerge in women’s concerted action to support more equitable learning relation-
ships. This leads in one example to the inception of a new learning programme
(Chap.€5) and in another to new approaches to learning relations (Chap.€3). In the
chapters above, mutual support helped women to develop learning to address un-
equal power relations (Chap.€6) or to enter workplaces where power relations con-
tribute to women’s under-representation (Chap.€5).
The problem of gendered learning is related to deficits in the workforce ca-
pacity. At the same time, women’s exclusion in areas such as SET has a wider
detrimental effect on society. Networks (face-to-face and mediated through tech-
nology) sustain progress in women’s learning, supporting and enabling them to
address the cultural changes needed to make workplaces conducive to their ca-
reers, opening up new identity possibilities. As the chapters in this section dem-
onstrate, gendered choices in learning are significant in women’s (and men’s)
marginalisation.
The authors in this section offer an alternative vision that promotes women’s
contributions and the importance of their shared experience. They suggest new
possibilities that can contribute to effective and equitable learning. These forms of
learning are important in promoting inclusive cultures that can inform future work-
places. The analysis of learning experiences in this section of the book forms the
I. Malcolm ()
School of Education, Social Work and Community Education, University of Dundee,
Nethergate, Dundee, DD1 4HN, UK
e-mail: i.z.malcolm@dundee.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 85
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_7, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
86 I. Malcolm et al.
K. Thomas ()
Schools and Colleges Partnership Service, University of the West of England,
Frenchay Campus, Coldharbour Lane, BS16 1QD Bristol, UK
e-mail: kate2.thomas@uwe.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 89
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_8, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
90 K. Thomas et al.
qualified to Level 41 and above to over 40%. In Chap.€ 11, Anita Walsh reminds
us that there is an acceptance that ‘workplaces need to be conceptualised more
clearly as learning environments’ (Billett 2006, p.€38) and certainly, UK curriculum
and qualification developments increasingly emphasise work-related knowledge
and skills. For example, a key feature of the new diploma qualification for 14–19
year olds is ‘an insight into what work is really like’ (14–19 Diplomas 2009). The
Foundation degree, an intermediate higher education qualification was introduced
in England specifically to ‘provide graduates…needed in the labour market to ad-
dress shortages in particular skills’ (QAA 2004, p.€ 1) and aims to ‘equip people
with the relevant knowledge, understanding and skills to improve performance and
productivity’ (www.fdf.ac.uk).
In the global knowledge economy and in the educational response to it, ‘core
workers are expected to be active lifelong learners’ (Stevenson 2002, p.€2), able to
adapt and respond to rapidly changing demands. Yet ‘there is little explicit recogni-
tion that the ways in which the learner–worker is placed in the knowledge economy
are gendered, “raced” and classed’ (Webb et€al. 2006, p.€564). All chapters in Part€II
consider the barriers faced by women in taking ‘responsibility for their own em-
ployability’ (Webb et€al. 2006, p.€565) whether these are funding regimes which
constrain opportunities for retraining (Chap.€9); unequal access to workplace learn-
ing opportunities (Chap.€ 11) or entrenched expectations that Iranian women will
prioritise familial obligations over economic participation (Chap.€12).
In Chap.€ 9, linking back in particular to Chap.€ 5’s consideration of women
returning to careers in SET, Linda Miller considers the relationship between gen-
dered employment choices and career decision-making at early and later stages in
the lifecourse. A gender segregated workforce has exacerbated the challenge of the
UK’s skills deficit and, Miller claims, specifically disadvantaged women in the de-
velopment of a high skills economy and in pay comparison with men. Drawing on
empirical evidence from a range of data sources, she considers what factors help or
hinder younger and older women to contemplate a broader range of employment.
In particular, she asks whether older women are more likely to be conditioned by
traditional beliefs and lifestyle choices and therefore more reluctant to change or
develop careers in atypical sectors such as construction and engineering? Miller
reflects on different models of career choice and Mercer’s work on the renegotia-
tion of self in mature students in HE/FE to argue that greater confidence and self-
knowledge mean older women are more open to atypical career choices. However,
she concludes that because retraining is essential to career and employment choice
in later life and because funding regimes discriminate in favour of younger learners,
older women’s career choices are likely to be limited by opportunity and available
funding. Conversely, younger women’s ‘employment choices are more gendered,
confined by self-concept and school and college discourses including information,
advice and guidance’ (Chap.€9).
1╇
Level 4 of the National Qualifications Framework (NQF) for England, Wales and Northern
Ireland is equivalent to the Certificate in Higher Education in the Framework for Higher Educa-
tion (FHEQ).
8â•… Part II: Introduction 91
Suzanne Hyde continues to explore the tensions between government policy and
women’s experiences in Chap.€10. Like Miller, she focuses on the experiences of
older women in an English context, but as with Chap.€9, her findings and conclu-
sions are far more widely relevant. Hyde employs a life history analysis approach
to the learning journeys of low-paid, female, union members attending a range of
union-funded courses in the workplace. The involvement of unions in the workplace
learning agenda has created its own tensions, not least because shifts in emphasis
towards funding for younger learners, and skills for older learners, together with
a contraction in liberal adult education have significant implications for equality,
class, gender and race. Hyde considers the ‘implications for a “feminised” model of
learning and its relationship to the current skills agenda’ (Chap.€10).
The learners’ stories reveal a complex relationship between non-instrumental
and instrumental motivations for workplace learning. Whereas individuals’ non-
instrumental reasons for learning contradict the skills focus of the workplace learn-
ing agenda, their learning is nevertheless shown to have considerable instrumental
benefits to the individual and to the organisation. Learners reported increased con-
fidence and self-esteem as well as positive changes to workplace relationship and
career development. Instrumental reasons for workplace learning were also more
complex than they first appeared, particularly where the courses involved were re-
flective rather than competence-based. Hyde concludes that a distinction between
soft and hard outcomes of skills-related learning is, like the agenda itself, too sim-
plistic. How much more complex is the picture when gender and other equality
issues are considered?
Anita Walsh demonstrates this complexity in Chap.€11, with a detailed exami-
nation of the evolution of work-based learning into an accredited ‘equivalent’ of
academic knowledge and a consideration of the effect of gender on access to work-
place learning. Walsh argues that the lifelong learning debate now recognises the
‘sociality’ of knowledge, knowledge and learning produced through social practices
(Chap.€11); her chapter traces the positioning of workplace learning as a widening
participation tool within higher education and as a key mechanism for upskilling the
workforce within the knowledge economy. However, rather than expanding career
and educational horizons, Walsh argues that without a greater degree of critical re-
flection and changes to organisational and structural constraints, this wider recogni-
tion of workplace learning reinforces existing gendered divisions in the workplace,
rather than providing opportunities for wider participation in higher education.
Walsh shows how the gendered, classed and ‘raced’ nature of paid employment
results not only in unequal access to workplace learning, but to an inequality of im-
pact. In the lower occupational levels of the labour market where roles are markedly
gendered and women predominate, the impact of work-based qualifications such
as the National Vocational Qualification (NVQ) has been, Walsh argues, to confine
women to those occupational areas. This continues the impact of the hidden curricu-
lum in schools which directs girls towards ‘feminine subjects’. She also concludes
that the fact that women represent the majority of part-time learners on Founda-
tion degree courses linked to low-status, low-paid roles suggests that this means of
widening participation in higher education is reinforcing occupational segregation.
92 K. Thomas et al.
Walsh points out that ‘learning intensive’ and ‘learning deprived’ work environ-
ments can and do occur within the same organisation with women less likely to be
able to access ‘learning intensive’ environments at graduate and higher levels of se-
niority than men. Where women with formal qualifications gain access to ‘learning
intensive’ environments, they are vulnerable to a lack of critical reflexivity which
perpetuates gendered organisational practices and to structural constraints of child-
care and part-time working on their labour market choices. Overall, Walsh argues
that there is a failure to recognise that women in all sectors of the labour market
require access to educational opportunity including workplace learning at different
points throughout their lives.
Women’s changing relationship with the workplace at different points in their
lives is a theme also taken up in Chap.€12. While authors Narjes Mehdizadeh and
Gill Scott focus on issues and barriers specific to Iran, their perspective nevertheless
consolidates this section’s wider theme of inequality in educational provision and
labour force participation. The contradictions in the relationship between Iranian
women’s high rates of educational achievement and low rates of economic activity
are highlighted in the specific barriers to labour force participation experienced by
graduate mothers. Mehdizadeh and Scott place these issues in the wider frame of
development and citizenship, noting that the latter too often reflects male entitle-
ment to education and employment and that women’s agency plays an essential but
too often unrecognised role in development.
In common with other chapters in Part€II, the authors argue that women’s eco-
nomic participation and therefore access to work-based learning, is limited by
societal beliefs, attitudes and care responsibilities. Since 1989, both education
and employment in Iran have remained dominated by societal beliefs and norms
which dictate a domestic role for women. Women remain restricted to employ-
ment in particular, largely public sectors, notably health, education and social
care. Structural problems with Iranian workplace learning mean that this does not
offer a remedial or alternative course of action once women are in employment.
Social barriers exist to female entrepreneurship. The authors therefore argue that
despite significant increases in Iranian women’s rates of educational achieve-
ment, in confining women to particular subjects and sectors and in failing to con-
nect curricula to the requirements of the Iranian economy or the possibilities of a
knowledge economy, women’s educational achievement has not proved economi-
cally liberating.
Mehdizadeh and Scott conclude their chapter by highlighting the experience of
Iranian graduate mothers, reinforcing the theme of the tensions between policy and
experience which has run throughout this section. Access to childcare provision,
they argue, is as important to developing women’s labour force participation as the
development of a knowledge-based economy. Yet a national requirement on Iranian
employers to provide childcare for female employees has resulted in restricted fe-
male recruitment. Similarly, a positive emphasis on the development of women’s
economic participation in national policy is at the very least, hampered by a re-
statement of the ‘strength of the family institution’ within which women’s caring
role is automatically assumed.
8â•… Part II: Introduction 93
References
Linda Miller
Introduction
This chapter sets out the policy background behind attempts to encourage women to
enter gender-segregated areas of work in England. It then considers factors within
individuals themselves and within the work environment that facilitate or, converse-
ly, inhibit attempts to encourage women to move into gender-segregated occupa-
tions. The chapter also examines current funding policies in England and considers
whether these support or inhibit attempts to encourage women to re-train and gain
high-level qualifications in atypical, gender segregated, areas.
Before moving on to consider these issues, however, some explanation needs to
be given regarding the way in which UK policy is developed now, following the
establishment of the devolved governments of Wales and Scotland. Much of the
current skills policy is being driven by the conclusions of the Leitch review (Leitch
2006), which concluded that, for the UK to become a world leader in skills by 2020,
attainment at most levels of skill would need to be doubled. Subsequent to the
Leitch review, a UK-wide Commission for Employment and Skills was established.
Although the Commission for Employment and Skills now directs skills policy
for the UK, the UK government decides training and funding policy only for Eng-
land, rather than for the UK as a whole. Policies relating to training and funding
in England are implemented through the Department for Business, Innovation and
Skills (BIS)1. Different policies—for example, on what level qualifications to offer
or prioritise, and how to fund them—are set and followed in Scotland and Wales.
While policies emanating from BIS apply only to England, policies developed by
the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) and relating to employment issues
1╇
BIS has had responsibility since its inception in June 2009. Between June 2007 and June 2009
responsibility for this policy area lay with the Department of Innovation, Universities and Skills
(DIUS) and before that the Department for Education and Skills (DfES).
L. Miller ()
Institute for Employment Studies, Brighton, UK
e-mail: linda.miller@employment-studies.co.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 95
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_9, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
96 L. Miller
apply within Scotland and Wales as well as within England. Therefore, while any
broader issues regarding occupational gender segregation and gender-differentiated
patterns of qualification apply across the UK, discussion of specific policies in this
chapter (such as funding through Train to Gain) relate only to England.
The broad issues pertaining to gender segregation in work, education, and train-
ing are considered next.
2╇
Although this finally seems to be changing: Trends in ‘A’ (Advanced) level results reveal that
females are gradually increasing their share of science ‘A’ levels; data are available from the UK
Resource Centre for Women (www.setwomenresource.org.uk).
3╇
The Equal Opportunities Commission has statutory powers under the Sex Discrimination Act to
instigate a General Formal Investigation where there is prevalent gender segregation in employ-
ment and training; the work looked at employment, education and training in five strongly segre-
gated areas, but looked in particular at the situation regarding apprenticeships.
9â•… Women Work-Based Learners 97
people entering some of the more strongly segregated areas of the economy, such
as construction and engineering, which means that employers are effectively being
forced to look outside their traditional recruitment pool for potential recruits.
Secondly, the government has stated its intention to move towards a ‘high skills
economy’, and indeed, this is also part of the strategic goals of the European Union
(EU) for all its member states. The EU Lisbon Summit meeting in 2000 set out
its intention to make the EU ‘the most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based
economy in the world’ and indicated that there would be a need for investment in
education and training to address the subsequent skill requirements. In the UK, the
gender gap in qualifications is seen as contributing to the national skills deficit that
impedes progression towards a ‘high skills economy’. The 2003 White Paper 21st
Century Skills, Realising Our Potential (DfES 2003) identified intermediate level
skills deficits in female workers as a cause for concern—in particular ‘skills gaps
in…intermediate skills at apprenticeship, technician, higher craft and associate pro-
fessional level’ (DfES 2003, p.12). The White Paper also indicated that women’s
labour market disadvantage was linked to this lack of skills and stated that it was the
government’s intention to increase the skill levels of all under-represented groups
in society, but particularly women workers who are typically locked in a ‘narrow
range of low level manual occupations’ and in part-time work where training op-
portunities are limited. It was also noted that older women tend to have lower levels
of qualification than younger ones.
Lastly, membership of the EU imposes a requirement upon the government to
address perceived weaknesses in the labour market. The Employment Action Plan
(EAP) for the UK for 2003 identified the gender pay gap and occupational segrega-
tion as two issues that needed to be addressed by government policy. The main ac-
tions identified by the Government in the 2003 EAP to address gender segregation
comprised largely of actions focussed on the science sector along with reference to
increasing promotion of work–life balance, increased childcare provision and finan-
cial incentives. The EAP also identified the EOC’s General Formal Investigation
into gender segregation as being part of the UK’s actions to address occupational
segregation, although the EOC is independent of the government and therefore not
what one might normally consider to be part of a National Action Plan. It should be
noted, though, that the focus on occupational gender segregation had disappeared
by the time that the 2004 EAP was produced.
The above sets out three of the reasons why the UK government has become
more interested in recent years in encouraging women to gain qualifications and
move into sectors in which they have traditionally been under-represented. How-
ever, there is another, arguably much stronger, reason why the government wants
to encourage more women to consider areas of work more traditionally associated
with men, and one that might also be expected to be persuasive for the majority
of women, too. On average, today, women still remain far more poorly paid than
men—current EOC estimates are that there is an 18% ‘gender pay gap’ between
the average female and male employee in the UK. John Forth and his colleagues at
the University of Essex have estimated that occupational segregation accounts for
a significant proportion of this pay gap between women and men—some 20% for
98 L. Miller
full-time workers and 14% across all workers (Forth et€al. 2003). The argument,
then, is that if women could be persuaded to enter jobs in atypical sectors such as
engineering and construction, this would go some way towards reducing the in-
equalities in pay between women and men.
In principle, then, there are jobs, and well-paid jobs at that, into which we might
expect to see women flocking in their thousands—but they do not. So the first
question has to be, why is this? The 2003 White Paper implied that ‘the problem’
lies with older women, and, furthermore, the implication was that older women
are somehow making perverse decisions both in not actively seeking to attain the
intermediate level qualifications that would bring increased financial rewards, and
in failing to consider sectors that are far better paid than those in which the majority
of women work.
So, first, let us consider the position of older women in the jobs market. One pos-
sible explanation for older women’s reluctance to consider atypical areas of work
might be that older women grew up at a time when cultural beliefs about gender
stereotypes were stronger and, as a result, are more attached to traditional ideas
about the feminine sex-role stereotype and ‘female identity’ and, because of this,
prefer to avoid atypical areas of work. Is there any evidence that older women have
more stereotypical beliefs or are more ‘set in their ways’ and reluctant to change?
Research into changes in sex-role stereotypes over time indicates that, as might be
expected, older people do hold more traditional beliefs regarding appropriate sex roles
for women and men. Furthermore, researchers such as John Archer (Archer 1999)
have demonstrated that occupational identity is a central part of our self-concept, and
therefore it might be reasonable to conclude that, if older women have more tradition-
al sex stereotypes, then they would be more likely to reject masculine occupations as
being incongruent with their self-concept, or at least with that part of the self-concept
that relates to sex-role stereotypes and appropriate roles for men and women.
However, it would appear that this is not the main reason why older working
women do not choose to retrain and enter more highly paid male areas of work. The
main reasons seem to lie in more pedestrian factors—mostly to do with training and
funding opportunities. If anything, the research evidence that will be described in
the following sections indicates that, nowadays, the trend is for women to become
more open minded with age regarding possible job options and training—at least
in principle. But there are barriers to overcome, and largely these lie outside the
self, not within. These issues will be explored in the following sections, starting
first with evidence relating to younger women and then moving on to consider the
position of older women.
Encouraging younger women to consider atypical areas of study and work might
initially be considered an easier task than persuading older women. However, as
already indicated, the entry statistics for qualifications such as GCSEs (the General
9â•… Women Work-Based Learners 99
Although this appears not to be the case in males, for whom if anything, rigidity with regard to
4╇
career choice seems to be a problem that is more ‘set in stone’ than amongst females.
100 L. Miller
Table 9.2↜渀 Correlations of occupational preference ratings with occupational gender segregation
(OSRSI) and occupational sex-role stereotyping (OGSI) indices for 23 occupations for boys and
girls in four age groups. (Source: Miller and Hayward 2006)
Boys Girls
OSRSI correlated with occupational Age range 14–15 0.648** −0.648**
preference Age range 15–16 0.772** −0.759**
Age range 16–17 0.729** −0.470*
Age range 17–18 0.782** −0.189
OGSI correlated with occupational Age range 14–15 0.645** −0.638**
preference Age range 15–16 0.779** −0.749**
Age range 16–17 0.724** −0.517*
Age range 17–18 0.779** −0.288
*pâ•›<â•›0.05; **pâ•›<â•›0.01
Changing Careers
It is easy to envisage the career trajectory for many females, for whom the career
path starts with the decision at 16 to enter a job in a stereotypically female area of
work. Following some time in that job—and possibly after having a family—she
may start to think that this is perhaps not what she wants to do for the rest of her life
and begin to think about what her options are. By this time she is older and, often,
more confident, and may start to look around at other jobs in the organisation (or
elsewhere). At this point she may recognise firstly, that other jobs bring better re-
wards, both personal and financial; and secondly, that she herself is just as capable
as some of the individuals she sees in those other roles.
There is research that backs up this model of the way in which women start to
change the way in which they think about themselves and about their potential job
options with increasing age and experience: For example, in another piece of re-
search commissioned by the EOC as part of the GFI into occupational segregation
Dale et€al. (2005) report how many of the women they interviewed said that they
had only come to the atypical work area later on in life, often after having overcome
obstacles to get there.
By this time they were more mature and had more confidence and therefore were
more able to consider and deal with other—perhaps masculine—work environ-
9â•… Women Work-Based Learners 101
ments. Although research does suggest that sex-role stereotypes become less impor-
tant with increasing age, this may not however necessarily be of central importance
in understanding how this change process occurs. An alternative explanation arises
from the fact that, with increasing age we are presented with many more opportuni-
ties to see evidence of our own abilities and therefore with opportunities to re-assess
ourselves, and this may well lead us to consider areas of work that we had previ-
ously dismissed. This explanation derives from the work of Daryl Bem (Bem 1967),
who suggested that we make judgements about ourselves using the same sorts of
information that we use to make judgements of other people. So eventually, over
time, we build up an idea of ourselves as someone who (perhaps despite our earlier
trepidations) is rather good at some particular skill. Much of the literature on older
learners reinforces this view. For example the Dale et€al. study cited above reported
that women said that being able to work in atypical areas such as carpentry, ICT, and
mechanical engineering had ‘given them a new understanding of what they could
achieve’ (Dale et€al. 2005, p.12).
It is perhaps appropriate at this point also to consider some of the models of
career choice. A very great number of theories have been proposed to explain the
bases for individuals’ career choice. The two I would like to focus on are, firstly,
one that considers the various factors that become salient at different stages of de-
velopment (proposed by Linda Gottfredson) and, secondly, one that examines the
way in which individuals’ changing circumstances and self-perceptions impact on
choice (proposed by Donald Super). Both of these theories would seem to be of use
in understanding the way in which women’s career decisions may alter with age.
The Gottfredson model of career choice (Gottfredson 1981) suggests that an indi-
vidual’s interests and abilities assume importance rather later in the lifecourse than
do factors such as the extent to which the job is sex-role stereotyped (and congruent
with the individual’s gender) and the status of the occupation (see Table€9.3). This
is in line with the suggestions made above, that individuals become more aware of
their abilities and interests with age. Gottfredson’s model suggests that sex typing
is so central to the individual’s self concept that they will not willingly abandon this
in making a career choice. However, it should be noted that subsequent research has
indicated that, in fact, individuals will abandon sex type of job more willingly than
the Gottfredson model suggests—mostly through necessity, as the majority of high
prestige jobs tend to be those done mostly by males (e.g. see Hesketh et€al. 1990).
The final stage of the Gottfredson model sees ‘field of work’ being decided upon
at age 14 plus. However, this need not necessarily imply that the individual remains
fixed in their view from this point on and at this point it is useful to consider the
ideas of Donald Super (1957; 1990). Super proposed the idea that people can cycle
repeatedly through the stages of career choice when major changes or transitions
occur, with these choices being based on their self-perceptions and their self-con-
cept. In other words, Super’s conceptualisation of career choice explicitly acknowl-
edges the fact that people change, and their ideas about themselves in turn change
with age. If we combine this idea with Gottfredson’s model then we can start to see
how additional information about our abilities can become incorporated into later
decisions about careers and training. The stages described by Gottfredson’s model
are shown in Table€9.3. If we combine the ideas of Super with this model then we
can see that the ‘14 plus’ column could be extended to become a series of columns
that reflect major transition and choice points. In fact, a similar idea has recently
been proposed by Mercer (2007) to explain the process of renegotiation of the self
and the self-change, development and growth that she hypothesises takes place in
mature students in further and higher education.
For girls, the Miller and Hayward (2006) data shown in Table€9.2 suggest that the
significant shifts in their opinions about jobs start to take place around about the age
of 17 or 18. The main point to make here of course is that this change in perceptions
occurs beyond the age at which young people have made the qualification choices
that effectively set their career path for several years.
This means that, if a woman decides to move into an atypical area of work after
this age, she will most likely need to re-train. The next step then would be to con-
template gaining the qualifications necessary for entry to that new career path. But,
despite government rhetoric on the need to increase the skills base of adults in the
UK, this is where the real hurdles start. These issues are considered next.
What happens if women5 want to change career later in life? Is re-training possible?
The first point to note is that there are several different factors that go into making
re-training ‘possible’. The first is willingness, and institutions such as Birkbeck,
which provide access to degree programmes through part-time study, are testimony
to the fact that older people are more than willing to return to learning, when it is
made accessible. And that last caveat regarding accessibility is central to ensuring
that people who want to learn can learn. Access issues—access in terms of geog-
raphy, timing of provision and funding of learning options—are foremost amongst
decisions to return to learning, and these factors are arguably even more potent bar-
riers to learning in the vocational arena than in academia.
What is the situation confronting a woman seeking to re-train in a vocational
subject? First, patchy provision is more likely to be an issue in the vocational sec-
tor. In research into the factors influencing choice of course upon leaving school,
5╇
Or, indeed, men: the same hurdles outlined in this section apply equally to men seeking to
change career direction.
9â•… Women Work-Based Learners 103
lack of choice was cited by more adults as a reason for their decision by those who
had taken a vocational award than by those who had followed an academic course
(Miller et€al. 2000a). Second, recent research into the reasons for individuals drop-
ping out from further education revealed that 8% of early leavers said that the times
of the course did not suit their working hours and 6% said it was too difficult to
balance the course with other commitments (Simm et€al. 2007).
However, the main problem confronting a woman who decides to re-train is
likely to be funding. Despite Government rhetoric apparently promoting lifelong
learning, an apprenticeship is likely to be almost completely out of the question:
even if a woman wishing to re-train managed to persuade an employer to take her
on as an apprentice in the new area of interest, then she (and more to the point, the
putative employer) will probably find that she is not eligible for funding for an ap-
prenticeship, for in England statutory funding for apprenticeships ends at age 25,
and in reality now it mostly ends at 19.6
In addition, despite the UK Government having flagged up the need for more
people in the workforce to attain higher-level skills, the majority of the funding
policy developments in England for work-based learning for the past three or four
years have focussed on level 2 awards (rather than level 3). The Train to Gain (TtG)
initiative (and its forerunner the Employer Training Pilots which ran for three years
before Train to Gain was introduced), is now the main funding route for work-
based training outside of standard apprenticeship funding. There are three issues to
note regarding this funding programme. One is that until very recently—until late
2006—only training up to level 2 was funded via this strand. The second is that full
funding is provided to attain a first level 2 only, so if the individual already has a
qualification at level 2 then TtG will not provide the opportunity to re-train.7 And
note that a ‘first level 2’ is defined as equivalent to five GCSEs at grades A–C.
Therefore many people who might not consider themselves to have any relevant
vocational qualifications but who did a handful of GCSEs at school—indeed, who
really do not have any vocational qualifications, for a handful of elderly GCSEs8
is unlikely to be of much use in changing career path—will nonetheless find them-
selves ineligible for funding under this programme.
In its original incarnation this funding stream also did nothing to help any older
individuals—men as well as women—to gain the coveted level 3 (intermediate lev-
el) qualifications that the Government considers to be key to economic prosperity.
6╇
Conflicting policies often lead to funding being inadequate to achieve all Government targets.
Although the Government is keen to raise the number of individuals with level 3 qualifications, a
seemingly greater priority in recent years has been to reduce the number of young people (those
aged under 19) not in education, employment or training (NEET). This has led to a prioritisation
of funding for under 19€s, along with a consequent curtailment of funding for those aged over 19.
Although the Government announced changes to funding for older people in 2007, this has had
very little impact; this is discussed at the end of the chapter.
7╇
Although there are signs very recently (2009) that the rules regarding this point are starting to
be applied less stringently now.
8╇
Or the older GCE ‘O’ levels and Certificate of Secondary Education (CSEs); all of these are
considered ‘equivalent’ to a level 2 award.
104 L. Miller
To be fair, and as indicated above, this changed in 2006 to allow funding towards a
level 3 qualification, and ‘level 3 pilots’ are currently being trialled and evaluated
at various locations around England. These include two level 3 pilots in the London
area aimed specifically at women and, elsewhere in England, pilots for ‘level 3
jumpers’: individuals who do not have a level 2 qualification (i.e. who do not even
have five GCSEs) but who are deemed to be employed in jobs that would support
their direct entry to a level 3 qualification without first completing a relevant level
2 qualification. This is only part funding though: the entitlement is for the cost for
attaining a level 2 award and the individual or employer is required to make up
the difference. It is also questionable quite how many such individuals exist (that
is, working in level 3 jobs with no qualifications). There is also part-funding for
individuals who have a level 2 award to progress to a level 3, but again this requires
either the individual or, more likely, the employer, to pay the additional amount,
(and this is less than the entitlement for individuals who do not have a first level 2)
and again, it should be pointed out that this is to support progression in the indi-
vidual’s current employment.
The intention is that the level 3 strand of the funding programme will be rolled
out nationally in due course. So, it is appropriate to ask, will roll-out of funding
under TtG help women gain access to the training courses required to start a career
in a new sector? Well, probably not. While in principle the funding does provide an
entry route into training, the money is made available only for employee training
and only via the employer—the employer has to agree the training for existing
employees. The first and most obvious point to be made therefore is that this fund-
ing is available primarily for people who are already employed,9 and the training is
focused on their current job. Therefore while this may help existing employees to
engage in further development, it does nothing to help women who want to move
out of traditional female areas of employment (nor, indeed, males who wish to
change employment area).
In the event of an employer deciding to recruit an unqualified woman into an
atypical area of work, then in principle they would be eligible to receive funding for
training for a level 2 or for part-funding towards a level 3, once the level 3 funding
is extended nationally. We should perhaps ask how probable it is that employers
will take on unqualified women in traditionally male areas of work? On grounds
of current evidence this does not seem very likely. Although there has been much
rhetoric about the need for employers to recruit women in order to avert ‘the skills
crisis’, it remains questionable quite how willing the average employer is to take on
women—even qualified women—in traditionally male areas of work. While there
may have been some movement on this point, our research undertaken as part of
the EOC GFI into occupational gender segregation indicates that there may still be
quite some way to go yet:
9╇
Some limited funding is available for unemployed people through Job Centre Plus, albeit with
restrictions.
9â•… Women Work-Based Learners 105
The potential employer said, ‘This is a job for big strong men. We don’t want women
coming in here with their hormones. You can’t keep your nails clean if you work here, you
know. We want to keep this factory all male.’
We had a roofer ring up to advertise for an apprentice, and he said, ‘Well I don’t think my
wife would like it if I had a nice young dolly bird up on my roofs.’ Miller et€al. (2005)
It should be noted that the first of the employers quoted above had said this while
interviewing a young woman who had already completed most of a level 2 appren-
ticeship programme at a well-known, reputable training company in the area and
who was now seeking a position as an advanced (level 3) apprentice. The quotes
serve to demonstrate just how unwilling some employers remain to take on females
as trainees or apprentices (irrespective of whatever the law may say) despite in other
respects being seen as falling into the more ‘positive’ end of the training attitudes
spectrum, since they were in general favourably disposed towards employing and
training apprentices. A persistent problem in the UK, and one with which many
Sector Skills Councils are currently grappling, is the fact that many employers are
unwilling to employ and train apprentices at all—or indeed to train any staff—and
prefer to recruit only trained staff. Therefore, women wishing to retrain stand no
chance of being considered by such employers and, as the evidence reveals, irre-
spective of whatever the law might say in this regard, only a sub-set of those who
do take on and train apprentices are willing to take on females—even those who are
already part-qualified.
It would not be true to say that the Government is entirely unaware of the im-
plications of its funding policies for adult learners who wish to engage with the
lifelong learning agenda. In 2008 the White Paper ‘World Class Apprenticeships:
unlocking talent, building skills for all’ (DIUS 2008) announced Government plans
to make apprenticeships available for up to 30,000 older workers and to increase
in general the number of places on level 3 programmes. In reality, though, few of
these adult apprenticeships have actually materialised. In addition, while increased
numbers of funded apprenticeships for older workers in principle potentially might
resolve some of the barriers to vocational re-training for older people, in reality the
intention to fund many of these apprenticeships through the Train to Gain funding
strand means the proposed changes will provide little help for older women wishing
to train in any areas other than those in which they are already employed. Therefore,
while these new proposals are broadly welcomed, the intention to route funding
via employers means that many—and probably most—of the barriers for women
outlined in this chapter are likely to remain in place.
In other words, women are prevented by age, by any existing, possibly irrelevant,
qualifications they may hold and by dint of being in existing employment from
gaining access to funding for re-training. The only remaining option is training that
is made available through Job Centre Plus; however, seeking funding through this
route would require any employed woman who was considering a career change to
first resign, bringing consequent restrictions on benefits, which any woman with
children is particularly likely to try to avoid incurring.
Therefore, the funding regime currently in place essentially militates against
women wishing to re-train, rather than assisting them. In fact, the current funding
106 L. Miller
regime does virtually nothing (aside from facilitating access to career development
loans) to assist anyone—men as well as women—who wishes to change career
direction, even if they wish to move into areas of work for which the country has
an urgent need for more skilled individuals. In particular, the funding regime ac-
tively works against the government rhetoric regarding the need for more women
to move into higher-skilled and more lucrative areas of work. This leaves funding
by the individual themselves (either through their disposable income or via a ca-
reer development loan) as the sole route available, and countless reports in the past
have pointed to the fact that women typically have far less disposable income than
do men, making it much less feasible that they will be able to afford to fund any
re-training themselves either directly or via a loan (and this is without considering
related issues such as whether vocational programmes are available at times conve-
nient to people who are employed or indeed at a convenient location).
Given the fairly limited success to date in encouraging older females into atypical
areas, the Government has started to think about targeting younger groups of learn-
ers. Young Apprenticeships (YAs) are vocational awards taken by pupils aged
14–16 while at school. Typically, young apprentices go to a college or private train-
ing provider for the training (usually a day a week), and also they undertake work
placements across the two years of the programme.
The education and training partnerships that submitted bids to offer these quali-
fications were required to state in their applications how they would address equal
opportunities issues. The then DfES (now DCSF10) commissioned the Institute for
Employment Studies (IES) to examine the extent to which the provider partner-
ships had achieved a more diverse group of pupils over the first two years of the
programme. At present it is rather a patchy picture with only occasional pockets of
good practice (Newton et€al. 2006; Newton et€al. 2007). The IES team discovered
that one of the ways in which some providers have been trying to encourage a more
diverse group of learners is to offer ‘taster’ sessions—short sessions either in the
college or training environment in which they can gain some practical experience
of the subject. This would appear to be a sensible approach, since one of the factors
that has been identified as making females less likely to move into atypical areas
of work is a lack of any relevant experience in that area—i.e. having no experience
to use as a basis upon which to make a decision about whether or not they have the
ability to cope with the various activities involved in a subject.
The Government is currently very keen on taster sessions and is trying to encour-
age more providers to offer these.11 But will the sessions really help? At present,
Part of DfES became DCSF while part became DIUS, now BIS.
10╇
And indeed, the outcomes of the IES work includes a toolkit that can be used by education
11╇
providers to help them design taster sessions in a way that ensures they will attract a more diverse
9â•… Women Work-Based Learners 107
with just a few exceptions, it rather looks as though tasters are reaching only those
young people who have already more or less decided on an area, rather than really
providing opportunities to those who are not already attracted to the subject. But if
tasters were offered more widely—perhaps on a semi-compulsory basis, to ensure
that young people are exposed to areas of work which they might otherwise have
no experience of, which is one suggestion that has been put forward—would they
help?
My own work on how people make judgements about their own performance on
novel and complex tasks suggests that tasters need to be designed carefully; handled
wrongly, this approach could end up doing more harm than good. In this final sec-
tion I am going to consider what happens to men’s and women’s confidence when
exposed to short practice sessions, after which I will return to the question of sex-
role stereotyping and decisions about atypical areas of work.
The first of the studies (Miller 1991) used a design in which participants were
asked to make a rating of their confidence after receiving instructions for a com-
plex problem-solving task but before starting a short practice session; they were
then asked to make a second rating at the end of the practice session but ahead of
a test session. Half received feedback during the practice session and half did not.
In terms of performance, there was no difference in the numbers of errors made by
females in comparison to males; nonetheless, for females undertaking the task with
feedback (which told them how many of the items they had answered correctly or
incorrectly), their confidence fell after the short practice session; males’ confidence
rose.
In a second study the same basic design was used, in that participants were given
instructions, followed by a practice session followed by a test session. However,
in this version of the task, participants could elect to work through as many prac-
tice items as they liked (up to a maximum of 20) before starting the test phase. In
this study participants were asked to fill out the Personal Attributes Questionnaire
(PAQ; Spence et€al. 1974) to give an assessment of the extent to which they were
sex-role stereotyped.12 One point is worth noting. While there was no actual differ-
ence in the number of practice items chosen by males or females (irrespective of
any difference in expressed confidence), participants who had scored highly on the
‘feminine’ scale of the PAQ chose significantly more practice items (in fact, double
the number) than did the more masculine participants.
group of young people. The toolkit is available as a free download at: http://www.employment-
studies.co.uk/pubs/summary.php?id=444&page=2.
12╇
Since the PAQ was introduced Spence and her colleagues have revised their views so that now,
the PAQ is conceptualised as measuring ‘gender differentiating personality traits’ rather than sex-
role stereotyping per se, with the gender differentiating dimensions being labelled ‘instrumental-
ity’ and ‘expressivity’. Recent assessments (e.g., see Miller et€al. 2000b) indicate the scale still has
validity in differentiating between males and females, with males on average continuing to assess
themselves as more ‘instrumental’ (originally the ‘masculine’ dimension) than do females, while
females continue to assess themselves on average as more ‘expressive’ (originally the ‘feminine’
dimension) than do males.
108 L. Miller
Taken together, these two studies suggest that, first, a limited amount of practice
with feedback can serve to undermine women’s confidence; and secondly, ‘femi-
nine’ stereotyped women (who still remain the largest of the four population ‘sub-
groups’ obtained when women are grouped using instruments such as the PAQ or
Sandra Bem’s 1974 Bem Sex Role Inventory) may be particularly discouraged by
limited experience on difficult tasks in which there is a likelihood of witnessing
failure in the early attempts.13 Given that taster events feature practical sessions of
necessarily limited duration, this suggests that this new approach to engaging with
atypical groups needs close examination to ensure that short sessions do not serve
to reduce the confidence of some young people.
The focus of this article has primarily been on women who wish to make career
changes that would require vocational training. In particular it has considered the
implications of Government funding policies for women seeking to re-train and
gain level 3 vocational qualifications. However, it is not just in the vocational arena
that Government policies are likely to have particularly severe implications for
women. The White Paper that announced the introduction of adult apprenticeships
was shortly followed, in September 2008, by a consultation letter sent out by the
Secretary of State for Innovation, Universities and Skills, which stated the Govern-
ment’s intention to withdraw support for students within HE who choose to study
for ‘Equivalent Level Qualifications’ (ELQs), that is, for a qualification at the same
(or lower) level as that already held by the individual. The Secretary of State argued
that this was because it was better to focus what funding there was on individuals
entering higher education for the first time, or pursuing a qualification at a higher
level than they already held; it was not fair to expect the public purse to support in-
dividuals in gaining a second qualification at the same or lower level and, therefore,
funding would be withdrawn from these individuals. Thus the same restrictions are
now being applied to those seeking to change career by gaining a second academic
award as have been applied to those who sought to change career by studying for
vocational awards; funding is now effectively denied to all individuals who hold an
existing qualification.
There would be few problems with this policy were it the case that all initial
education decisions were based on sound advice and a full understanding of the
occupational options available to individuals consequent upon their qualification
choices. But we know that guidance and advice on qualifications and careers is
one of the weakest points of current provision. We know that many women—even
highly educated women—opt into certain areas of work not through any informed
choice but because they are unaware of what other options may be available to them
13╇
And, in fact, the same is true of ‘feminine’ stereotyped men, although generally speaking these
constitute a very small sub-group.
9â•… Women Work-Based Learners 109
(Hurstfield et€al. 2006). Consequently, many often end up in low-paid jobs that then
render them unable to pay for training that would in turn allow them to move into
better-paid areas of work and out of the poverty trap.
Rubery and Rake (2000) have commented on the failure of the UK government
to assess the gender impact of new policies and integrate such assessments into its
policy analyses. The decisions to scrap support for equivalent-level qualifications
and to fund apprenticeships for older workers through Train to Gain both appear
to be further examples of the Government’s failure to assess the potential gender
impact of its policies; both these decisions are likely to have far more severe impli-
cations for women than they will for men.
Conclusions
There appears to have been an assumption in much of the equalities work that older
women are not so favourably disposed towards jobs in atypical areas as are younger
women, and that most effort should be focussed on removing the barriers to younger
women who wish to enter education, training and work in atypical and strongly
segregated sectors. An overview of the research suggests instead that older women
have more confidence and that this, combined with their previous employment ex-
perience, makes them more likely to consider atypical areas of work. However,
older women are more likely to be caught in a funding trap if they want to re-train.
Above the age of 25 they are ineligible as individuals for any statutory funding,
while any funding channelled through the Train to Gain funding programme would
be focussed on their current job, rather than on preparing them for a significant job
change. Set against this, younger girls are more concerned about the views of their
peers, less confident about being the odd one out in a group, less able to stand up
to bullying and more likely to have inaccurate views of the jobs (Miller et€al. 2005;
Millward et€al. 2006); although they can get funding to go into these areas, very few
choose to do so.
As indicated earlier in this chapter, some of the recent work, such as that by Mill-
ward and her colleagues, suggests that job choice is influenced by the nature of the
individual’s own sex-role stereotyping (at least in younger people). John Archer’s
work too suggests that jobs form a central part of self-identity. Although there is
some evidence of cultural shifts in sex-role stereotyping (Miller et€al. 2000b), these
shifts are slight and the majority of people—even young people—remain consis-
tently gender sex-typed (that is, males remain largely masculine-sex-typed and fe-
males remain largely feminine-sex-typed).
Taken together, this might suggest that any expectation of achieving a completely
even gender balance across occupations is unrealistic, at least in the foreseeable
future. This is not to say that we should not continue to offer a full range of oppor-
tunities to all individuals. However, irrespective of whether psychological factors
such as extent of sex-role stereotyping do actually constitute a barrier to expanding
the career opportunities of women, what we can be certain of is that the current
110 L. Miller
funding policies most definitely do not help. What is also evident is that they do not
help men either. The focus of funding policies for older workers on the develop-
ment of workers in their existing jobs has effectively cut off support for any worker
wishing to change career and, in so doing, cut off the potential supply of new and
enthusiastic recruits into areas of skills shortage.
The White Papers set out the Government’s position in trying to encourage wom-
en to gain higher-level skills and move into more lucrative areas of work. However,
there will need to be far more thought given to the supporting and enabling policies
that are needed to make this a reality; rather than joined-up policies, there currently
seem to be joined-up barriers in place. At present, these policy barriers appear to
constitute far more of a hurdle than do any deficiencies in confidence deriving from
self-identity.
Acknowledgements╇ I would like to thank my colleagues Jim Hillage, Becci Newton and Marie
Strebler for helpful discussions on this chapter.
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Chapter 10
Where is Gender Within the Workplace
Learning Agenda?
Suzanne Hyde
In this chapter, I will discuss the findings of a 32-month Higher Education Euro-
pean Social Fund research project where we set out to examine whether particular
types of workplace learning opportunities (brokered by the Trade Union, UNISON)
aimed at low-paid women workers, result in changes in self-esteem, employability,
take-up of training opportunities and any associated relevant cross-cutting effects
of age and ethnicity. The research was conducted between February 2004 and Au-
gust 2006 with a remit to include England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
I was the sole Research Fellow on the project and was guided by a Steering Group
with representation from academic colleagues and from UNISON. In outlining the
research journey and findings, I refer here to ‘we’ or ‘our’ as my thoughts are as a
result of dialogue with these colleagues as much as they are with the research data
(although any errors are my own).
Initiated by UNISON Open College and brought to fruition by the Centre for
Continuing Education at the University of Sussex, the research captured the ex-
perience of learners in their own words. UNISON describes itself as, ‘Britain and
Europe’s biggest public sector union with more than 1.3€ million members. Our
members are people working in the public services, for private contractors provid-
ing public services and in the essential utilities’ (2008). At the time of our research
UNISON Open College was described by the Union as ‘the flexible learning arm of
UNISON’ (2006). The types of learning opportunities captured in our sample varied
but were all facilitated through partnerships between employers, employees and lo-
cal/national educational providers in order to offer formal learning opportunities for
employees and UNISON members.
We aimed to provide a body of stories from learners’ voices that could be used to
influence and inform policy makers and education providers concerning the provi-
S. Hyde ()
School of Education, University of Brighton, Brighton, UK
Centre for Community Engagement, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 113
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_10, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
114 S. Hyde
The research journey began with the collection of life stories from a variety of learn-
ers learning through UNISON-brokered courses. This included people working in
all types and modes of employment and formal learning. What all respondents had
in common was the study of something called a ‘course’ that was initiated through
the workplace (as a result of a UNISON brokering role) with defined learning out-
comes and formal assessment criteria.
As experienced adult educators, we were well aware of the rich and varied life
and learning journeys experienced by adult learners. Sometimes these stories are
articulated through reflective writing exercises or journals that form part of course-
work, and personal reflections also find their way onto student feedback forms. A
review of UNISON Open College research and evaluations indicated the absence of
any previous attempt to conduct a national life-history project with these learners.
Where student views had previously been elicited for research purposes, it appeared
to be through a questionnaire, interview or focus group model (e.g. Kennedy 1995;
Donaghy 2001; Darvill 2002). Learner narratives provide important insights into:
the direction of government policy, gender and class differences within workplace
learning, the role of the Unions in brokering learning, the conditions for enabling
learning, notions of progression and the importance of outcomes for individual,
families and communities; ‘biographies of adult students highlight the problems
that they experience as a result of government policy. Specifically, biographies
powerfully reveal the contradictions within narrow, vocationally driven lifelong
learning policies’ (Merrill 2005, p.€139).
In 1995, Helen Kennedy undertook a national evaluation of specific UNISON/
WEA (Workers’ Educational Association) learning provision, Return to Learn
(R2L), a core course in their shared workplace learning package. This modular
course encourages self-reflection and is social sciences and study skills orientated.
Other WEA courses based on a similar model and taken by those in our sample
included ‘Women’s Lives’ and ‘Women, Health and Society’. Our research sample
10â•… Where is Gender Within the Workplace Learning Agenda? 115
is well represented by learners who have included one or other of these courses in
their learning journey (over two-thirds).
Kennedy’s evaluation of R2L provided a backdrop and a benchmark to our re-
search. However, since the evaluation was conducted 10 years before our inves-
tigation, the economic, social and political context had shifted and the current
workplace learning policy agenda had become much more firmly focused on the
acquirement of work-related and basic skills. We were interested in whether learn-
ers’ stories would allow us to explore the implications for a ‘feminised’ model of
learning, (Kennedy’s term), and its relationship to the current skills agenda. Our
research attempted to chart the often messy, complicated and non-linear progression
routes of learners, where learners often take several courses at a similar assessment
level before progressing to higher-level courses (see Hyde 2006).
We collected 35 pieces of writing from learners, and conducted in-depth inter-
views with 52 learners; we gathered the stories of 70 learners in total. We made
contact with learners in a number of ways including leaflets, web and magazine
advertisements on Union and educational websites, direct contacts with tutors and
class visits to WEA courses. Information packs included hints on how to write or
tell your story, a consent form and a form that allowed us to collect a range of quan-
titative data (outlined later).
Note: Extracts from learner stories are followed by their initials in brackets
throughout the rest of this chapter.
We wanted to explore whether the personal journey and the types of personal dis-
closure that are possible in adult education settings are different in the workplace,
accounting for individual agency in the negotiation of workplace learning opportu-
nities. A life-history approach, with its capacity to show us individual experience,
mapped against the experiences of others, helped to facilitate this. It allows us to
understand what is going on, in terms of the life and learning process and how they
inter-link (West 1996). We were able to capitalise on the fact that many learners are
already reflecting on these issues in UNISON-brokered courses such as R2L and
many express positive benefits from this opportunity. Alheit and Dausien talk about
the ‘biographicity’ of social experience and the individual and collective rewards of
telling our stories:
If we conceive of biographical learning as a self-willed, ‘autopoetic’ accomplishment on
the part of active subjects, in which they reflexively ‘organise’ their experience in such a
way that they also generate personal coherence, identity, a meaning to their life-history and
a communicable, socially viable life-world perspective for guiding their actions, it becomes
possible to comprehend education and learning both as individual identity work and as the
‘formation’ of collective processes and social relations. (Alheit and Dausien 2002, p.€17)
learning opportunities accessible to all. It allows us to capture the life and learning
journey, with all its twists and turns, and shows the power of personal agency when
activated by enabling learning:
…biographies, importantly, illustrate the dialectics of agency and structure. Viewed from
this perspective, biographical research has the potential to offer a radical and emancipatory
approach to research within popular education. (Merrill 2005, p.€135)
Yet despite the promises offered in the ‘education, education, education’ pre-elec-
tion mantra by Tony Blair at the 1996 Labour Party Conference, there has been
subsequent disillusionment amongst adult educationalists with New Labour poli-
cies and how they impact upon lifelong learning beyond a narrow skills-led agen-
da. Alan Tuckett, Director of the National Institute of Adult Continuing Education
(NIACE), commented ‘it needs a leap of faith now to believe the Government still
wants learning that is life-wide as well as life-long’ (Tuckett 2006).
The adult education sector where women are traditionally well represented, is un-
der threat. NIACE reported in 2006 that one million learning places were threatened
over the following two years and that there was already evidence of a steady decline
in engagement with formal learning for the over 55s with funding cited as the big-
gest reason for non-engagement. However, workplace learning, where women have
been traditionally under-represented, is being promoted through legislation such
as the Employment Relations Act 2004 (DTI 2004). This shift in emphasis on the
site and purpose of learning has implications for equity issues as there are large
inequalities in who gets access to workplace training, with budgets and planning
skewed towards those that already have qualifications.
Those with the lowest levels of educational attainment are also the least likely to participate
in work-related education or training. Only 11% of people employed who had no qualifica-
10â•… Where is Gender Within the Workplace Learning Agenda? 117
tions reported receiving training in the past 13 weeks compared to 42% of degree holders.
(Bates et€al. 2005, p.€19)
The Learning and Skills Council (2006) reports that women are overrepresented
amongst those with no or few qualifications, and are significantly under-represented
amongst those holding Level 3 (A level or equivalent) qualifications. Older workers
are also disproportionately represented amongst those with no or few qualifica-
tions—one in four, compared to one in ten for younger members of the workforce.
The survey also revealed that members of the workforce from minority ethnic com-
munities, particularly those of Bangladeshi and Afro-Caribbean origin, are more
likely to have fewer than average or no qualifications (Learning and Skills Council
2006).
New Labour emphasis on the workplace as a site of learning and the attainment
of skills as the purpose of learning has included the promotion of Trade Union
involvement with lifelong learning (Leitch 2006). Since 1998 there has been a
marked increase in the number of people accessing learning through Union initi-
ated activity. The Trades Union Congress claims that since 1998, 60,000 em�ployees
have signed up for Union-brokered learning and that this number is likely to in-
crease to 250,000 by 2010 (Trades Union Congress 2004). At the same time that
a skills-led workplace learning agenda was being promoted, adult educators were
expressing fears that a ‘skills-deficit’ model was being embraced by the Unions
at the expense of provision that offered workers a space and place to learn that
was not tied to a narrow set of functional skills. The Leitch Review places firm
emphasis on skills, ‘all publicly funded adult vocational skills in England, apart
from community learning, [should] go through demand led routes by 2010’ (Leitch
2006, p.€138).
Tensions around Trade Union engagement with the skills agenda were in evi-
dence in our engagement with educational providers involved in delivering Trade
Union learning such as the WEA:
It is very exciting to see people previously denied opportunities changing, but the nature of
the curriculum is a very important issue. Some of us in the WEA are nervous of the move
by employers and Trade Unions to a skills-based NVQ curriculum—this is a qualitative
shift in the wrong direction. We must avoid such a strong emphasis on skills otherwise the
old liberal education agenda of learning for learning’s sake will start to seem like a radical
agenda. We must continue to ask ourselves—is workplace education, workers education?
(Miskin 2004)
Forrester (1999, 2002, 2004, 2005) charts the role of Unions in collaborating with
or challenging the New Labour rhetoric on lifelong learning and, in particular, their
engagement with workplace learning agendas. He urges Unions to promote an edu-
cational framework informed by ‘democratic citizenship’ rather than one led by
employability and/or notions of a ‘skills crisis’. He is critical of the TUC (Trades
Union Congress) in particular for uncritically embracing the New Labour skills-led
model of workplace learning and views it as part of ‘…a widespread and contested
restructuring narrative of radical, neo-liberal changes within the labour market, in
the nature of work and even in the nature of capitalism itself’ (2005, p.€262). He also
points out that an understanding of the gender and political relationships shaping
118 S. Hyde
UNISON, the Union with the largest involvement in learning, launched its Open
College initiative in 1994, promoting Open College Network accredited, flexible
learning (Kennedy 1995; Munro et€al. 1997). The current range of courses avail-
able to UNISON members originated in the National Union of Public Employees
(NUPE), one of the three partner Unions that formed UNISON in 1993. NUPE’s
members were predominantly women, mainly in low-paid, often part-time jobs and
a significant number were from BME groups. According to UNISON, more than
two-thirds of its members are women (2007).
Today, many learning opportunities promoted by the UNISON are as a result
of partnerships brokered with employers (Munro and Rainbird 2004). During our
research cycle, courses were delivered by four main educational providers—the
largest was the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA), Learn Direct, the Open
University (OU) and the National Extension College.
Data supplied from the educational providers who deliver UNISON-brokered learn-
ing indicated that during the academic year 2002–2003 (as defined by each pro-
vider) across England there were 6,450 learners learning on courses brokered by
UNISON. A total of 84% of learners were women and the average age of learners
was 45. Data on the ethnic background were not available in a meaningfully com-
parative format from the educational providers.
Quantitative data from our 70 research respondents indicated that 85% of re-
spondents were women, 88% reported that they had left school at or before 16 with
few or no qualifications, 82% reported a gross income of £15,000 per year or less,
70% reported having taken at least one non-skills-based course through UNISON
and the average age of learners was 44.
As we only captured ten male respondents we felt unable to make firm sugges-
tions about the comparative experience. Of those we heard from, motivations and
experiences appear similar to those of female respondents. We suspect that low
pay and issues related to social class may be as significant as gender in under-
10â•… Where is Gender Within the Workplace Learning Agenda? 119
In the research project report (Hyde 2006) we made the distinction between en-
gagement and participation offered by Barton et€al. (2005, p.€7), who point out the
former is concerned with ‘purposes, why people come’ and the latter is defined as
‘the practices they engage in while they are there’. In this section, I will focus on
the motivations for engagement articulated by learners. The issue of learner motiva-
tion is important in relation to our understanding of initial engagement with formal
learning as an adult, why people progress from one course to another and the type
of learning perceived by learners as best suited to their needs:
Detailed qualitative accounts of learners’ lives—their identity, background and circum-
stances—can provide rich evidence for explaining learners’ motivation, preferences and
trajectories…. Students’ biographical contexts and experiences can be the most important
resources they bring to learning. It is therefore critical for teachers to get to know their
learners as well as possible. (Quality Improvement Agency, n. d.)
Many of our respondents did not start their return to formal education through UNI-
SON. Rather, UNISON-brokered education formed part of a complex pattern of
non-linear learning, much of it self-initiated, perhaps through evening classes and
often as a result of a life turning point or catalyst such as having a first child reach
school age:
The life stories told by many adult learners reveal the way in which returning to learn is
used as a way of dealing with change and transition in their lives at the personal and societal
level. (Lea and West 1995)
Key motivators for initial engagement pertinent to women learners in our sample
were non-work-related motivations (also referred to here as ‘non-instrumental’)
not dissimilar to those found in other adult education settings (Crossan et€al. 2003;
McGivney 1999; Merrill and Alheit 2004). These non-instrumental motives in-
cluded: critical turning points and changes in the life cycle, perceiving the learn-
ing to be fun and pleasurable, seeking a bit of ‘me’ time, getting out of the house,
meeting new people, seeking adult company, relieving boredom, a desire to pick
up on a general education missed out on in earlier life or keeping up with chil-
dren’s homework. These motivations were reflected in the stories of women learn-
ing through the workplace, at a time when the government’s workplace learning
agenda is focused on particular job-related skills—there appears to be a disjuncture
between the two.
120 S. Hyde
We can see some of these non-instrumental motivations, (which reflect the ma-
jority of our sample) in the comments below:
Originally I just went along not because I wanted to gain anything, for the fun of it really,
just to see if the old grey cells were still working…. I didn’t really intend to go any further
than doing that course. I went into it in a light-hearted way, and I was doing it purely for
fun. I didn’t have any ambitions when I started doing the course. (JB)
We [Women’s Lives students] were all about the same age, and we all wanted a bit of ‘me’
time…. (TP)
Alheit and Dausien (2002, p.€14) report that, ‘for women, continuing training is not
a “neutral” instrument of career planning, but is embedded within a form of life
planning that is closely tied to opportunities and perspectives in the family domain’.
Even though the courses were taken in work-time or facilitated through work, in the
minds of learners, the courses provided a space and stimulus away from home-life:
At the time, because I was my ex-husband’s carer, that was my couple of hours of ‘me’ time
a week. And he knew that I was incommunicado. For those two hours, or two and a half
hours, whatever it was, every other Thursday, I was out of bounds. (TP)
The original thing was for me to do a course to meet people. I’m at work all day with little
ones, and then I come home and I’m with my daughter who doesn’t really talk to me much.
And it’s just to get out and I enjoyed the courses in the end. (NW)
The marketing of R2L and Women’s Lives by the WEA and UNISON, that high-
lights the fun aspects of learning, may contribute to the motivations expressed by
learners undertaking these courses. But this still raises questions about the attrac-
tiveness of the current skills agenda to this type of learner and the capacity to attract
and retain learners traditionally least likely to take up workplace learning through
promotion of an ‘instrumental’ skills and job aspiration model.
For many part-time women learners, even when the course was ‘skills’ orien-
tated, e.g. computer skills or an NVQ (National Vocational Qualification) in Ad-
ministration or Health and Social Care, the expressed motivation for engagement
with the course related closely to the motivations of women learners choosing non-
instrumental courses:
I think it came down to pure boredom really. I wasn’t working at the time, we’d just moved
into the area and didn’t know anybody. I just saw it advertised [NVQ Administration],
I€said, ‘well, it’ll get me out of the house and meeting people’. So I went along to the col-
lege, went through their interview, and started the course the following week, and it was
really good. (ED)
My daughter was going to school, she was beginning to start learning about computers, I
knew absolutely nothing about computers, so I thought, well that’s where I start. I…did. (SN)
Box 10.1╇ Less than one-third of our sample cited ‘work’ as the primary driver
for take-up of UNISON-brokered courses. Of those that did, these motives
included:
1. Taking courses that had become legislative requirements of the job, e.g.
NVQ Level 2 Health and Social Care
2. Taking courses perceived to address specific skills for the workplace, e.g.
Computing or Counselling
3. Taking courses on issues or topics relevant to the workplace, e.g. Death,
Dying and Bereavement (an OU course popular with care workers)
For learners in the first category in Box€10.1, instrumental motivation was expressed
as a fact of life in their particular job market, e.g. it was a legislative requirement
or was a tacit rule of the workplace for those seeking promotion. It reminds us that
motivations for learners engaging with workplace learning do not take place in a
political vacuum: the growth of the ‘knowledge society’ is:
…raising the pressure on individuals to meet certain standards of skill and knowledge
before they can be employed. The risks of exclusion for those who fail to meet those stan-
dards are more draconian than was ever the case…. Of course, the logic of exclusion is by
no means new – class and gender remain the decisive indicators…. As would be expected
age plays an increasingly significant role. (Alheit and Dausien 2002, p.€10)
Others reflected upon the difference between courses such as R2L and Women’s
Lives, which were perceived to be a matter of personal choice, as opposed to NVQ
type provision, increasingly being offered as a requirement of the job and govern-
ment legislation:
I think the pressure’s on. If you don’t do it, you won’t know your job, and if you don’t know
your job, it can affect your salary. If it’s not on paper…it would be looked at that you’re
not suitable for that job. I think the way forward would be to say, ‘Well OK, you can go on
any course that you choose this year.’ One course even that you would want to do. Flower
arranging or something…we get the learning accounts through the NHS…but that’s got to
be linked to your development. And I think it would be nice that they say, ‘right, you can go
on any course you want,’ …to develop you yourself. (SE)
Some learners reflected that their first and main motivation for taking up learning
through work were the needs of the job itself (category 2 in Box€10.1). These learn-
ers put themselves forward for skills-based courses as opposed to R2L/Women’s
Lives type provision:
122 S. Hyde
I attended this course [counselling skills] with the hopes/aims of learning how to enhance
my skills at my workplace, X police station: dealing with police staff, advising UNISON
members, understanding bullying and grievance procedures. I also hoped that the skills
that I learnt on this course would help me in dealing with distressed and vulnerable wit-
nesses and victims of crime, which is part of my job within the criminal justice unit with
Y Constabulary. (JK)
Category 3 in Box€10.1 reflects those learners who stated that the primary attraction
was course content focussed on ideas and topics relevant to the workplace such as
those relating to Health and Social Care (rather than an enhancement of learners’
particular skills). These work-related ‘issues’ courses, mainly delivered by the OU,
offer an interesting counterpoint to the skills courses such as NVQ. Both attract
learners because of work-related reasons, but the emphasis is arguably quite dif-
ferent. Where NVQ’s focus on demonstrating a range of practical competencies
already in use in the workplace, the OU model is closer to the reflective learn-
ing and student centred model found in adult education settings and on the R2L/
Women’s Lives courses. Particularly positive comments were made about some of
the OU courses that related to ideas and theories about particular client groups that
learners interface with in the workplace, for example, Death, Dying and Bereave-
ment and Health and Social Care. The content of these courses and their appeal to
learners may offer an interesting way forward to bridge the divide between non-
vocational courses and the workplace-related skills agenda being promoted by the
government. Differentiating between what we mean by work-place skills and what
we mean by vocational or non-vocational learning is as important as differentiating
motives for engaging with learning. Provision which fits the third category of in-
strumental learner identified in our sample (see Box€10.1), those attracted by work-
related ‘issues’, allows learners to reflect upon themselves and their practice as well
as developing new knowledge and skills:
[Death, Dying and Bereavement]…it just jolts you into reality and makes you think before
you say and do things. Because there are a lot of things that we take for granted…somebody
in the hospital, particularly older people…I won’t say they’re old-fashioned, but they find it
very difficult to be, washed for example. And you have to know how to look after those peo-
ple, how to approach them. Although I’m older and didn’t have a problem broaching these
subjects with them, it doesn’t hurt to see what’s recommended and you do remember those
things when you approach them at the bedside. So, it was enormously helpful really. (MC)
Despite the fact that the majority of women in our sample cited non-instrumental
motivations for taking up part-time formal learning opportunities through the work-
place, the majority also reported instrumental outcomes that they directly attributed
to this formal learning.
The majority of respondents used the terms ‘confidence’ or ‘self-esteem’ to talk
about the positive impact of learning, and most cited it as one of the biggest changes
in their lives. This occurred without active, direct solicitation from interviewers
and/or indirectly when learners were asked about ‘progress’ and ‘impact’ of learn-
ing. Some learners talked about confidence in general, whilst others related it spe-
cifically to how improvements in self-confidence have led to work-related achieve-
ments later in life. In stressing confidence gains I want to be careful not to suggest
that learners are a ‘blank slate’, entering formal learning with no confidence in any
arena of their lives:
Research carried out by practitioners with socially excluded people suggests that a level of
confidence is needed to participate in learning. Confidence can both be a pre-condition and
a by-product of learning. (Quality Improvement Agency, n. d.)
Other learners expressly link these formal learning opportunities to concrete changes
in working lives:
Out of all of us [on the course Women’s Lives]…there was quite a few that went on and
got different jobs…from there. Even if it was just one grade up or some went completely
different from say cleaner to health care assistant. (SN)
The auxiliaries…a lot of them went on to student nursing [from R2L]…and they went right
the way through…followed the path. …did Level 2, Level 3, then went on to go into student
nursing. (LP)
I think it’s helped me get a better job…. I can now say, ‘Yes I’ve done these courses.’ I
was actually part way through my course when I went to my job that I’m now doing. (TP)
Learner stories highlight that it is not just individuals who benefit from the learn-
ing opportunities taken-up. Although interviews with employers were outside the
remit of this research, it is clear from the findings of earlier research such as that
conducted by Munro and Rainbird (2004) that there are significant benefits for
employers engaging in workplace learning partnerships. Munro et€al. (1997) argue
that the practice of having some learners taking courses in the workplace can lead
to an overall ‘culture of learning’. Kennedy’s (1995) findings showed that taking
a formal course at work might help to establish support networks within the work-
place that could last beyond the lifespan of the course. In our sample, particular
praise was forthcoming for some workplaces and their promotion of a ‘culture of
learning’. An evaluation of the formalised role of Union Learning Representatives
demonstrates a direct link between taking courses and an increase in Trade Union
activity, specifically in the promotion of learning for others in the workplace, taken-
up by women employees not previously engaged in Union activism (Wood and
Moore 2005). The Leitch Review also raises the issue of a ‘culture of learning’ but
mainly in relation to an arguably narrow agenda—the promotion of a new careers
service and learning accounts. An embracement of the promotion of networks of
learning appears marginal or absent from much of the Leitch rhetoric (Leitch 2006,
p.€ 140). Many learners in our sample documented that they had become Union
10â•… Where is Gender Within the Workplace Learning Agenda? 125
Another learner who started her journey with R2L, followed by a course called
Women, Work and Society and is now a tutor, organiser and manager of adult learn-
ing in the workplace comments:
People at work asked what was the point as I was aged 53 when I graduated, what was
I going to do with it? My only answer was that it had been a personal challenge but at
some point I realised that I did not want to continue being a nursery nurse for the rest of
my working life. It increased my confidence and belief in myself. My husband on retiring
was encouraged by my success and took up training himself and is now a magistrate. We
have three grandchildren and the eldest at 14 thinks its ‘cool’ to have had a Grandma at
university. (KA)
Conclusions
This research, which focused mainly on the learning experiences of older, low-paid
women workers, came at a time when the skills-led policy agenda in workplace
learning was (and is) arguably ignoring the evidence of gender differences and
equalities issues in relation to patterns and sites of learning. Exciting and important
relationships between gender, ageing and lifelong learning that many hoped ‘The
Learning Age’ (Green Paper 1998) might transfer into policies aimed at promoting
diversity of adult learning provision, are evident in learners’ stories but arguably
absent from current policy drivers (see Leitch 2006). The presence of education
that is appealing and accessible to the older, low paid women workers in our sample
is present in spite of the workplace skills agenda not because of it. At least 75%
of learners in our sample began their return to formal learning on non-vocational
courses such as R2L and Women’s Lives; provision which has struggled for survival
in the skills-led policy drive.
A word search of the Leitch Review reveals that gender is mentioned only once
(Leitch 2006). Since the Leitch Review was published, there has been a public
consultation on the equalities implications through the draft: equality Impact
Asses�sment (NIACE 2006). This acknowledges differences within potential work-
place learners and specifically acknowledges the practical barriers of childcare,
travel and domestic responsibilities that often affect women learners (Edwards
1993). An acknowledgement of these issues (as long as it translates into policy and
practice) is to be applauded. However, a sophisticated, nuanced and gender aware
education policy also needs to recognise the more complex issues of identities,
self-confidence, perception and attractiveness of different types of learning and
the motivations for engaging (or not) in workplace learning that are articulated by
learners themselves. If the Governments goal is an improvement in ‘skills’, there
needs to be recognition that there is more than one way to reach this goal and lis-
tening to the experiences of learners is a good starting point for understanding the
relationship between motivation for engagement, types of learning and learning
outcomes.
Learner stories suggest that the use of terms such as ‘soft’ outcomes (often re-
ferred to in relation to the ‘distance travelled’ by learners) and ‘hard’ outcomes
(often referred to in relation to quantifiable changes in jobs or number and level of
courses taken) found in education research and practice, may impose an over-sim-
plification of learners’ experiences and mask a complex relationship between the
two. Many learners move in and out of so-called instrumental and non-instrumental
courses and use transferable skills and subject knowledge, passing from one to the
other, to complement the learning journey. Alan Tuckett, Director of NIACE, re-
flected on these issues:
You don’t need to denigrate learning for personal and community development to make
the case for a skilled economy. Employers endlessly tell Government that ‘soft skills’ are
what the system fails to develop. The skills of team working, communicating effectively,
problem solving, working flexibly and applying creativity are at the heart of good working
practice in the modern economy. Such skills can be developed in liberal education classes
10â•… Where is Gender Within the Workplace Learning Agenda? 127
at least as well as in vocational ones. And learning is not a neat business: it leaks. Skills
and confidence acquired in one place apply elsewhere. Managers know this, which is why
so much money is spent on executive away days building castles in the air. And, for young
people and adults alike, you cannot tell the purpose of the student from the title of the
course. (Tuckett 2006)
Understanding gleaned from biographies can enrich the planning and marketing
of provision as it illustrates motivations through the life course. A biographical
approach to researching the learner experience allows us to understand the learn-
ing process and how this relates to the wider life journey instead of just counting
the outputs of learning, e.g. the number of courses taken. Life stories can be very
powerful in demonstrating to learners, educators, Trade unionists, policy makers
and employers the importance of the transformative possibilities of learning. This
biographical approach shows the capacity of learners to overcome gender, class
and age as potential barriers to learning, both in childhood and as adult learners,
‘Biographies offer a tool for critiquing structural inequalities and the inadequacies
and contradictions of lifelong learning and social inclusion policies’ (Merrill 2005,
p.€137).
Despite the emphasis from learners on non-instrumental motives for engaging
with UNISON-brokered courses and the lack of an instrumental focus in much
of the formal learning undertaken by older women in our sample, many learn-
ers reported positive work-related outcomes. Where work was cited as a primary
motive for engagement in learning, motives were as varied as the type of workplace
learning that was attractive to learners. If Unions, educational providers, employ-
ers and government want to see take-up of workplace learning and positive work-
related outcomes, they need to embrace a sophisticated gender, low-pay and age-
aware approach that understands the differences between types of motivations for
engagement with workplace learning, differences between workplace learners and
the potential to use models of workplace learning that go beyond merely an empha-
sis on ‘skills, skills, skills’.
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Chapter 11
An Opportunity to Widen Participation
Through Work-Based Learning? The Impact
of€Gender
Anita Walsh
This chapter will consider the extension of higher-level learning opportunities into
the workplace, and examine the effect that gender has on workers’ ability to take
advantage of such opportunities. Drawing a distinction between the young ‘novice’
learners inside the university and those more mature, more experienced learners
in the workplace, the chapter will consider both the gendered nature of the labour
market, and the effect this has on restricting women’s access to the educational
opportunities which are developing through work-based learning. Consideration
will be given to both formal and informal structuring of the constraints which are
experienced by women workers, and proposals will be put forward relating to how
work-based learning could be used to help women overcome the occupational bar-
riers they face.
In recent years, there has been a strong policy emphasis in the United Kingdom
(UK) on widening participation in higher education, and on ensuring that under-
represented groups are encouraged to progress from school into higher-level learn-
ing. Considerable resources have been devoted to supporting both the attraction
and retention of such students—for example, in the allocation of the ‘post code
premium’ (additional funding allocated to institutions for students who are recruited
from areas with little experience of higher education) and the setting up of Lifelong
Learning Networks whose role is to support the transition into higher education of
those learners with vocational qualifications. These initiatives are intended to ad-
dress the higher educational needs of specific social groupings, and do not focus
on gender. Overall, girls and women are well represented in both compulsory and
post-compulsory education. For example, 39% of girls get two or more passes at
‘A’/Scottish Higher level, compared to 31% of boys, and there are more female than
male undergraduate students (Hibbett 2003, p.€507). However, these figures reflect
the current situation and, for people who are already in the workforce, ‘women
as a group are still more likely than men to have no qualifications, due to the fact
that older women are much less likely than older men to have any qualifications’
(Hibbett 2003, p.€507).
A. Walsh ()
Department of Social Policy and Education, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 129
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_11, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
130 A. Walsh
In addition to the social justice element of widening participation which has long
been part of the higher education debate but which, as previously stated, does not
explicitly address gender as an issue, a strong economic case is also being made for
greater access to university. Not just in the UK but also in the countries covered by
the proposed European Higher Education Area, it is argued that higher-level skills
are fundamental in supporting the competitiveness of the economy. In the recent
consultation on higher-level skills being undertaken by the Department for Innova-
tion, Universities and Skills (DIUS), the argument is put forward that:
High level skills—the skills associated with higher education—are good for the individuals
who acquire them and good for the economy. They help individuals unlock their talent and
aspire to change their life for the better. They help businesses and public services inno-
vate and prosper. They help towns and cities thrive by creating jobs, helping businesses to
become more competitive and driving economic regeneration. High level skills add value
for us all. (DIUS 2008, p.€3)
This confidence in the social and economic benefits that higher-level skills devel-
opment can bring has led to a focus on what are often referred to as ‘employability
skills’. Higher education institutions are increasingly encouraged to embed pro-
grammes to develop employability skills into the undergraduate curriculum. The
requirement to embed such skills is explicitly to provide full-time undergraduates
(who are assumed to be young and at the beginning of their working life) in devel-
oping the generic skills which are valued by employers at the same time as they
acquire more specific academic skills. Interestingly, the two sets of skills (employ-
ability skills and academic skills) are usually treated as distinct, and there is a re-
quirement for institutions to indicate where in a programme employability skills
are developed. Such an approach is in contrast to that taken by higher education
pre-widening participation, when an Honours degree of any sort was perceived to
integrate the necessary ‘graduate skills’ and was seen as effective preparation for
the graduate employment market.
As will be apparent from the discussion of the importance of developing skills
that make young people employable, much of the emphasis in current widening
participation policies has been on the ‘traditional’ student who is assumed to be
studying before entering the labour market. The mainstream policies and activi-
ties adopted under the umbrella of widening participation are therefore directed
at someone who is relatively young (under 30 years of age), and are designed to
encourage them to enter into conventional higher education. The assumption is that
such learners will enter university straight from school or from a college course
to take a full-time Honours degree programme which is designed to equip them
to enter the graduate labour market. As mentioned earlier there are more female
undergraduates than males in full-time study, most of whom are young women at
the beginning of their working lives. Yet, the gender-pay gap is higher among those
workers with degrees—‘women with no qualifications earn 85% of male equiva-
lent earnings for full-time work, and this falls to 79% for women with a degree or
equivalent’ (Hibbett 2003, p.€507).
In addition, there is one group of learners whose needs are not explicitly addressed
by current widening participation policies. For potential learners who may wish to
11â•… An Opportunity to Widen Participation Through Work-Based Learning? 131
undertake higher-level study but who have already entered employment or under-
taken domestic responsibilities of various sorts, the requirement to set aside these
responsibilities in order to enter full-time higher education is an unrealistic one. For
example, Reay (2003, p.€309) outlines the difficulties for women with children who
were taking an Access course to prepare them for higher education, and who found
themselves ‘caught up in a constant balancing act between wanting to study, meet-
ing domestic responsibilities, [and] needing to earn money’.
For these women, and other mature students with similar responsibilities, being
a student in higher education means something ‘entirely different from the concep-
tions and experiences of younger students’ (Reay 2003, p.€309). The idea of student
life ‘with its combination of independence, dependence, leisure and academic work,
was totally alien’ to the mature female students who were often sacrificing limited
leisure time in order to take the programme (Reay 2003, p.€309).
Moreover, although it is not immediately apparent from their widening participa-
tion policies, the Government does recognise that getting more young learners into
higher education will not be enough to address future skills needs. They are aware
that ‘around three-quarters of the 2020 workforce have already left compulsory ed-
ucation’ (DIUS 2008, p.€6), and acknowledge that people already in the workforce
will need to gain higher-level skills. Skills development for those adults already in
the workforce cannot be achieved using the conventional model of full-time higher
education, and many potential learners who are already fully employed would not
wish to become full-time students. In addition, they have often developed a level
of professional competence and a range of life skills which causes them to resist
becoming a novice in an educational context. Such learners are seeking a differ-
ent response from higher education than young students for whom full-time higher
education is part of their move towards maturity. They need a response that is more
inclusive and responsive to their particular needs, for example, in terms of flexible
timing and structuring of programme delivery and assessment.
Developments which support such a response are already taking place in higher
education. At the same time, as policies have been developed to encourage more
learners to enter mainstream higher education there has been an increasing recog-
nition that people learn in a far broader range of contexts than the purely formal
learning which takes place in schools and colleges. There is now an established
academic debate which engages with the recognition of this wider range of learn-
ing, and which considers pedagogic practice relating to learning outside the lecture
theatre (Chaiklin and Lave 1993; Tynjala 1999; Boud and Solomon 2001). As Skule
(2004, p.€8) states, ‘It is only during the last 30 years that the public policy debate on
lifelong learning has moved from a unilateral focus on institutionalised education,
into recognition that learning is “lifewide”, taking place at work and elsewhere.’
The contrast being made here is between an approach to lifelong learning which
assumed that the learners would need to attend educational institutions in order
to learn, and the approach which integrates informal learning from life and work
experience with formal learning in the lifelong learning debate. Such an approach
broadens the range of contexts in which learning can occur and affords recognition
to incidental informal learning in the workplace. Skule (2004, p.€9) points out that,
132 A. Walsh
learning which is acquired through general life activities. As Evans et€ al. (2004,
p.€222) point out, ‘The part played by tacit skills and knowledge in work perfor-
mance is well recognised but not well understood. It is one of the central tenets
of adult education that adults draw on life experience to good effect in learning
programmes.’ This statement emphasises the recognised value of informal learning
in supporting formal learning, but it is increasingly argued that informal learning is
the most valuable form of learning. For example, Skule (2004, p.€9) quotes Eraut
et€al. in claiming that, ‘Learning from other people and the challenge of work itself
proved to be the most important dimension of learning for the people we inter-
viewed. Although some reported significant learning from formal education and
training, this was by no means universal, and often only of secondary importance.’
It is perhaps worth reminding ourselves that most standard learning theories re-
late to the learning of children and young people, and therefore place the teacher
in a position of authority. However, those academic practitioners who engage with
adult learners and are developing new practices to accommodate experience-based
learning argue that, ‘the pedagogic model [which] permits the teacher to take full
responsibility for decisions about what is to be learned, how it is to be learned,
when it is to be learned and if it has been learned’ is an inappropriate response to the
learning needs of experienced adults (Laycock 1993, p.€4) In contrast to pedagogy,
Laycock advocates the adoption of an approach based on Knowles’ concept of an-
dragogy, which is defined as ‘the art and science of helping adults learn’ (Laycock
1993, p.€4). Such an approach involves the recognition that these learners are com-
petent adults, who have developed a range of capabilities and who are capable of
managing their own learning with appropriate support.
As indicated, the recognition of the importance of an experience base for learning
in context and the advocacy of a more egalitarian approach to working with adult
learners has a strong academic rationale and pedagogic underpinning. However,
the introduction of pedagogic practice to support experience-based adult learning
in the workplace and elsewhere has not been entirely straightforward. As Laycock
(1993, p.€129) points out, ‘No practitioner, however adaptive, would ever doubt the
political complexity of introducing such an innovation into…conventional practice.
In all work-based learning there is a serious challenge to the dominant discourse of
higher education, to what counts as a legitimate site of learning, to what counts as
legitimate knowledge.’ This is because, historically, the structuring and organisation
of higher education has been based on academic disciplines, and on the importance
of subject content. The knowledge produced through experience-based learning in
the workplace and elsewhere does not take the form of the abstract theory with
which the academic disciplines are familiar. Until recently, therefore, there was no
mechanism through which such learning could be awarded academic recognition.
Evans argues that it was the introduction of the higher education credit frame-
work which introduced the possibility that such learning could be recognised,
claiming that, ‘In 1986 CNAA [Council for National Academic Awards] established
a Credit Accumulation and Transfer Registry. Before that, work-based learning for
academic credit in higher education was off limits, beyond thought even’ (quoted in
Walsh 2007, p.€502). The principle underlying the credit framework introduced by
134 A. Walsh
the CNAA was that appropriate learning which was assessed should be recognised,
wherever it occurred. The intention with the framework was to support students
with professional and experience based learning to demonstrate the equivalence of
their learning to that contained in academic awards. The term ‘equivalence’ is an
important one, in that there was no attempt to demonstrate identity with the kind
of learning found inside the academy. Rather the intention was to show that the
sophistication of the learning was equivalent, i.e. that the nature of the learning was
similar even thought the content and context of the learning was different.
The credit framework includes a number of levels which are consistent with the
qualifications levels in the Framework for Higher Education Qualifications, and
for which there are credit levels descriptors. These descriptors indicate the generic
characteristics for a learning experience at a given level, and can accommodate a
much broader range of learning than that conventionally recognised by higher edu-
cation. A major advantage of credit levels in terms of the recognition of work-based
learning was that, in contrast to vocational awards such as National Vocational
Qualifications whose vocational framework is ‘functional, non-aspirational…[and]
concerned principally with performance to an agreed standard’ (Robertson 1994,
p.€155), the credit framework is concerned with recognising learning achievement.
As Gosling (2001, p.€282) points out, ‘The concept of level in credit frameworks
emphasises the importance of epistemological, curricular and personal develop-
ment.’ In addition, because the specification/explication of the characteristics of
learning required to meet the demand integral to a particular level was set out, it
‘enable[s] any given programme of learning to be identified as being at a given
level, regardless of whether it takes place inside or outside the university’ (Gosling
2001, p.€282). Credit therefore facilitated the full integration of experience-based
learning to academic awards, enabling work-based higher education awards to ‘do
more…than attest occupational competence…[to] set out to cultivate broader intel-
lectual abilities’ (Higher Education Quality Council quoted in Brennan and Little
1996, p.€13).
There therefore exists a mechanism whereby academic recognition of experi-
ence-based learning can be fully integrated into higher education awards. Such a
development is fundamental to being able to effectively reach out and respond to
the needs of mature learners in the workplace. This represents an important aspect
of widening participation, as it provides the access to university to those whose
personal circumstances mean they cannot access full-time higher education. In
addition, as Billett (2002, p.€57) points out, ‘For many workers, perhaps most, the
workplace represents the only or most viable location to…further develop their
vocational practice.’ The opportunity to gain academic recognition of workplace
learning can be of particular value to those workers who under-achieved at school,
or to those workers who have been either out of the labour market for some time,
or, as is the case with many women, who are working part-time to accommodate
other life responsibilities. This is of considerable benefit in the current context. The
facility to acquire formal academic qualifications without taking time out for formal
study, helps people develop themselves in a situation where ‘personal experience
and socio-economic change have become deeply entwined in recent years,…[as]
11â•… An Opportunity to Widen Participation Through Work-Based Learning? 135
care assistants and home carers, general office assistants and clerks, cleaners and
domestics, retail cashiers and check-out operators and customer care (EOC 2005,
p.€11). Charles (2002, p.€31) argues, ‘Women’s jobs…are associated with low pay…
low grade, low status, involve subservience, and are jobs that men would not like to
do. They are associated with “feminine” qualities of caring, being good with people
and dexterity.’ The roles in the list above would appear to support her contention.
The wider availability of work-based academic qualifications has real implica-
tions for women in these roles. Purely vocational qualifications such as National
Vocational Qualifications (NVQs) and Modern Apprenticeships are designed to
provide qualifications with a direct link to a particular type of employment. They
are designed to develop workplace competence in particular workforce roles, and
to respond to particular workforce development needs. Given the gendered nature
of the lower levels of the labour market, this means that any formal work-based
qualifications at lower levels are more likely to confine workers to the occupational
areas they already occupy. In other words, workforce qualifications such as NVQs
are likely to confirm women’s employment status, and help confine them to the low
grade and low status jobs previously referred to.
With regard to vocational qualifications in higher education, the introduction
of the Foundation degree (FD), a higher education award where programme de-
signers are required to integrate both work based learning and the award of aca-
demic credit for experience-based learning into the course, potentially offered a
real opportunity to extend participation in higher education (Jackson and Ward
2004, p.€433). The distinctive nature of the award, linked with the fact that often it
prepares learners for a specific occupational sector and is often delivered locally,
has meant that it is attractive to many ‘widening participation’ learners. The num-
ber of students taking FDs is growing quickly, and national policy envisages that
growth in student numbers in higher education will be predominantly in this area.
It is, therefore, interesting to consider the gender patterns which are emerging
here.
FDs can be taken either full time or part time, and there are clear differences
between the types of student opting for the different routes. Full time students on
these programmes were mainly 25 years old or younger; in contrast, 85% of stu-
dents enrolled on part time programmes were over 25 years of age (Quality Assur-
ance Agency (QAA) 2004, p.€13). About two thirds of the students enrolling on FDs
were female, but only 38% of female students studied full-time, compared to 74%
of male students (QAA 2004, p.€14). In addition, ‘the programmes reviewed reflect
the significant gender differences between subjects that are also seen at national
level. Women are a significant majority in FDs (sic) in education and social policy,
administration and social work. The subjects with most male students are comput-
ing, design and business studies’ (QAA 2004, p.€ 15). The gender balance in this
new vocational award is therefore consistent with established patterns of gendered
employment and education. And again, since the vast majority of part-time students
are over 25 and female, it is likely that the FD will operate to confirm women’s
confinement to particular areas of employment, many of which are low pay and low
status. Therefore, although offering part-time workers access to higher education
11â•… An Opportunity to Widen Participation Through Work-Based Learning? 137
via a vocational route, at the same time the awards are likely to reinforce the gen-
dered nature of employment to the disadvantage of female workers.
As indicated above, in addition to the introduction of FDs into higher educa-
tion, a more learner-centred approach to work-based learning has been developed
by a number of institutions. This gives learners the opportunity to take academ-
ic programmes which enable them to use their experience-based learning in the
workplace as ‘raw material’ for their studies. Such workplace programmes can lead
to either undergraduate or postgraduate awards, depending on the level of perfor-
mance involved. The availability of these programmes is limited at the moment, but
there is a great deal of interest in this area and practice here is developing rapidly.
As outlined earlier, such programmes introduce an important degree of responsive-
ness into academic programmes designed for work-based learners, and, in recog-
nition that work/life experience is not neatly organised into academic disciplines,
the programmes are designed to recognise any learning at an appropriate level of
demand. This requirement for learning to be at a level equivalent to that of other
awards in the UK Framework for Higher Education Qualifications (FHEQ) is an
important aspect of the maintenance of academic standards. However, it does have
very real implications for learners in the workplace who might wish to take such
programmes. For example, in order for a workplace learner to demonstrate achieve-
ment equivalent to that at Honours level of undergraduate study, they would have to
be in a context where they could demonstrate the following skills:
• The exercise of initiative and personal responsibility
• Decision-making in complex and unpredictable contexts
• The learning ability needed to undertake appropriate further training of a profesÂ�
sional or equivalent nature (QAA Qualification Descriptor for an Honours
Degree)
They would therefore need to be in an occupational situation which afforded them
an appropriate degree of flexibility and autonomy in their work role, in order to be
in a context which afforded the opportunity for the demonstration of such skills.
When considering the workplace as a site of higher-level learning, Skule (2004,
p.€14) points out that opportunities for learning in the workplace are not uniformly
distributed, and distinguishes between what he terms ‘learning intensive’ jobs and
‘learning deprived’ jobs. He lists the conditions for learning intensive jobs as being:
a high degree of exposure to change, a high degree of exposure to demands from
‘customers’, managerial responsibilities, extensive professional contacts, superior
feedback, management support for learning and the rewarding of job proficiency
via salary increases, promotion etc. Given the range of opportunities contained in
such jobs, these will be at higher levels in organisations, and could fall into the
‘graduate entry’ category. Certainly Skule says that a good education (by which he
means the achievement of high-level formal qualifications) is the route into learning
intensive work. However, he also outlines his finding that ‘For all levels of educa-
tion, men had more learning intensive jobs than women…’ (Skule 2004, p.€ 12).
This highlights the gender variation in returns to the investment in human capital
individuals make when they undertake higher education.
138 A. Walsh
It is worth emphasising here that Skule was not distinguishing between organisa-
tions offering learning intensive jobs and organisations offering learning deprived
jobs, but was considering the distribution of jobs within the organisations he stud-
ied. He was therefore observing what Billett would consider to be the outcome of
the power plays within organisations. While recognising that workplaces are sites
of significant learning, Billett also points out that workplaces can ‘have significant
limitations in terms of opportunities for learning, the prospects of securing effec-
tive learning experiences and the issue of recognition of that learning…’ (Billett
et€al. 2005, p.€219). This is because, in contrast to the bureaucratic discourse which
presents the functioning of organisations as neutral, the distribution of ‘Access to
activities and guidance through work can render learning opportunities either rich
or poor. The…factors that can make available and distribute these opportunities are
not benign’ (Billett 2002, p.€65). In other words, the distribution of learning inten-
sive roles will be affected by factors such as ‘seniority in workplaces…and work
demarcations…Workplace cliques, affiliations, gender, race, language or employ-
ment standing’ (Billett 2002, p.€62). Billett argues that such organisational practices
‘may well be organised to maintain the status and standing of one group of workers
(e.g. full-time workers) at the expense of another (e.g. part-time workers)’ (Billett
2002, p.€62).
When considering gender the impact of such practices is clear. Charles states
that, ‘At the beginning of the twenty-first century, processes within organisations
and, particularly, informal cultural practices, have been identified as reinforcing
gendered boundaries and gender identities.’ (Charles 2002, p.€43). As mentioned
earlier, lower-level jobs are clearly segregated by gender, but there is some evidence
that there are ‘more permeable boundaries in some middle class jobs’ (Charles
2002, p.€26). However, the professions are the only area where women are ‘making
inroads’ into mainly male employment, for example 61% of teaching professionals
are female (Charles 2002, p.€26). In addition, attitudes which attribute gender to
personal characteristics still operate and ‘qualities such as aggression, ambition, an
ability to exercise authority and cope with stress, a national affinity with machines
and superior intelligence’ are associated with men, which may help explain why
there are so few women in positions of real power (Charles 2002, p.€31). Even in
female dominated professions, for example, in primary school teaching where 86%
of teachers are female, what Lupton (2006, p.€105) terms the ‘glass escalator’ oper-
ates to elevate men to positions of authority. Fourty-one percent of head teachers of
primary schools are male.
As the Equality and Human Rights Commission (formerly the Equal Opportuni-
ties Commission) points out, ‘The lack of women at the top is all the more striking
given that girls now outperform boys at school, women account for nearly half the
workforce, more women than men are entering higher education and high-flying
professions like the law’ (EOC 2006, p.€2). However, in implicit recognition of the
lower returns to formal qualifications experienced by women, and of the impor-
tance of informal interactions in the workplace, they go on to state that, ‘Of those
women who have made it to the top, it is still too often the result of their exceptional
strength of character and drive to achieve despite significant barriers’ (2006, p.€2).
11â•… An Opportunity to Widen Participation Through Work-Based Learning? 139
Women make up the majority of part-time workers, and in the academic debate
relating to women and part-time work, Hakim’s ‘preference theory’ has been ex-
tremely influential. This puts forward the argument that full time women workers
and part time women workers have different attitudes to employment, and that part
time work is the result of different personal priorities (Walters 2005, p.€193). The
perceived advantage of Hakim’s theory is that it presents women as agents mak-
ing positive choices relating to their level of engagement with the labour market,
rather than being passively pushed into a particular segment of that market. How-
ever, Walters argues that Hakim understates the structural constraints that child care
places on the choices made by women, particularly those in lower income groups
(Walters 2005, p.€196). In the report of a study she has undertaken which explores
women’s attitudes to part time employment, Walters emphasises the influence that
the structure of welfare provision and social attitudes towards gender roles can have
on women’s participation in employment. Walters’ study focuses on part-time em-
ployment in the low status, low pay section of the labour market and the women
she interviews are all employed as check-out operators and general assistants in the
retail sector. This study offers a valuable insight into the workforce experience of
women who lack the high salaries which accompany professional status, and who
therefore are unable to buy surrogate care for their children.
Walters (2005, p.€ 196) points out that, ‘Despite the introduction of “family
friendly” policies in April, 2003, Britain remains a strong male-breadwinner state’
and that this places particular constraints on labour market choices for many women
with children. This emphasis on the male as breadwinner is accompanied by an
assumption that the female is carer, of both the breadwinner and any children of the
family. The availability of help with childcare is limited, as the EOC (2005, p.€16)
points out, ‘Since there are almost 4.7 million under eights in England and just over
a million places with childminders, in full day care or in out of school clubs, there
are four children for each place in these types of provision.’ Given the assumed
roles, this puts particular pressure on women who are trying to combine work and
family responsibilities. In Walters’ study many of the women were ‘satisficing’.
Satisficing is an economic term which indicates that, rather than maximising one’s
interests in a particular area, one is having to balance conflicting demands without
being able to maximise returns in any one area. Walters (2005, p.€209) uses the term
to indicate that the women were trying to balance family requirements and their
own working goals, without being able to maximise either. Many of the women
recognised the limitations of their current job, but felt that, while their children were
small, they had no alternative but to work in part time jobs requiring low levels of
expertise.
In the longer term, when their children had grown and become more indepen-
dent, a majority of the women intended to move to more challenging employment,
and some planned to return to education to gain qualifications which would help
them get a better job (Walters 2005, p.€205). However, evidence is that such part-
time workers can become ‘trapped’ in low-level part-time employment, because
they have lost any human capital they had previously accrued due to the low level
of their current role. In addition, they do not have access to training so that they
11â•… An Opportunity to Widen Participation Through Work-Based Learning? 141
can meet up to date job criteria (e.g. familiarity with particular computer packages)
(Walters 2005, p.€ 209). The emphasis on pre-labour market entry education and
qualifications neglects to address this issue that the organisation of employment is
such that many fewer educational opportunities are available for part-time female
employees, or that women outside the professions may need access to educational
opportunities at different points through life.
The current widening participation policy focus on 19–30-year-olds disadvan-
tages many mature workers, but the requirement for women to balance childcare
and career development in the absence of alternatives causes this group particular
problems. The wider availability of workplace education/training (e.g. through the
activities of UnionLearn) is a positive development, and does provide some women
workers with opportunities to develop their skills and education. However, scale of
organisation is an important factor in terms of access to such provision, and many
smaller organisations do not participate in such schemes. An alternative approach
would be the provision of funds for childcare in order to allow women to under-
take such training outside the workplace. This would be of real benefit to part-time
female learners, provided it was offered in a flexible way. It would also enable those
women who have left school with few or no qualifications, the opportunity to ex-
plore their personal and professional development from a standpoint of greater ma-
turity. Given the ageing nature of the workforce, and the current concerns that this
generates, it appears highly desirable to encourage further development of mature
workers at all levels of the economy. However, there is currently no indication that
the government intends to recognise the demands of this group of workers, and the
focus of the ‘work–life’ balance debate appears firmly on the professional family.
Within this debate the discourse tends to highlight shared family responsibili-
ties, with gender neutral terminology (e.g. parental leave) and it is easy to gain the
impression that, in professional employment, women have gained equality. It is,
of course, illegal to discriminate in employment on the basis of gender, but there
is clear evidence, not least from the requirement for the inclusion of gender in the
Equality Act 2006, that the passing of equality legislation during the 1970s has not
been effective in achieving either equal pay or equal opportunities for women in the
workplace. This situation can be extremely frustrating for women, in that they are
aware of the ‘glass ceiling’, and with regard to women’s effective access to higher-
level workplace learning, it is informative to consider the nature of organisational
structures and cultures.
Charles (2002, p.€37) claims ‘there is evidence that the cultures of many organi-
sations are masculine…practices [exist which] convey a message that women are
out of place and studies have shown that women receive this message loud and
clear’. However, even in organisations where such a strong masculine culture is not
evident, women often find themselves in more junior positions than their male col-
leagues. Martin (2006, p.€255) has undertaken an interesting exploration which offers
insight into the perpetuation of the disadvantages experienced by women in the
workplace. She argues that, by considering what she terms ‘non-reflexivity’ relating
to the practice of gender, it is possible to understand ‘why well-intentioned “good
people” practise gender in ways that do harm’. Her work offers an explanation of
142 A. Walsh
the way in which gender inequalities are still both tolerated and perpetuated. Mar-
tin points out that the practice of gender is well established, and ‘Like many other
social dynamics, the practising of gender is informed by tacit knowledge. Tacit
knowledge is associated with liminal consciousness; knowledge that is below the
level of full consciousness’ (Martin 2006, p.€261). She claims that, because this is
the case, many people act in gendered ways without really thinking about it as they
follow established organisational patterns. It is the non-reflexive nature of these
acts which perpetuates gender disadvantage, as this means it is acted out through
unintended informal processes. Martin (2006, p.€268) points out that, ‘When men
call women “girls”, they infantilize them and call into question women’s compe-
tence and authority’ and engage in a practice which appears trivial, but is in reality
undermining. In this context it is interesting to note that, when standing for election
as Speaker in the House of Commons recently, it was reported that John Bercow
claimed, ‘he would clamp down on “sexual remarks uttered sotte voce”’ (Stratton
and Perkins 2009).
For Martin the answer to the problem is to develop reflexivity with regard to
gender interactions. She argues that, ‘Reflexivity requires individuals to consider
carefully or meditate on their actions and their likely effects prior to behaving. To
be reflexive about gender entails the thoughtful consideration of one’s options…’
(2006, p.€260). In her view well-intentioned ‘good people’ who took this approach
to their own behaviour would moderate the way they practised gender. Interestingly,
this approach has strong echoes of the kind of reflective learning required of ‘reflec-
tive practitioners’. This model requires professionals to analyse and evaluate their
practice, and is a model which is widely used in the pedagogy of both experiential
and workplace learning. It is, however, a practice which learners can find extremely
difficult to develop, even when they are supported by educational professionals.
This makes it difficult to envisage how the practice of reflexivity could easily be
applied to social dynamics in the workplace. The consideration of gender dynamics,
which ‘routinely elude researchers’ efforts to capture them’, could pose a particular
problem for such an approach (Martin 2006, p.€268).
It could be argued, therefore, that, although practices are developing which do
support the recognition of workplace learning at all levels, and thus help widen
participation in higher education, female workers will continue to be disadvantaged.
Given the gendered structures and cultures of most organisations, wider availability
of workplace learning and qualifications is likely to help reinforce existing gendered
arrangements, if only through the unreflexive adoption of gender-based practices.
However, there is no reason why this should be the case. A different set of policies
would enable the wider recognition of workplace learning to start to address gender
disadvantages which women currently experience in their working lives. This could
be achieved in a number of ways. The transdisciplinary approach and the expe-
rience base which are integral to work-based learning provide specific elements
which could address the professional development needs of women at many levels
of the workplace.
For those women whose skills are losing/have lost currency because they have
been forced by domestic circumstance to undertake low skill part-time work, the
11â•… An Opportunity to Widen Participation Through Work-Based Learning? 143
possibility of developing generic skills could enhance both their confidence and
their skill set, facilitating their move to more responsible work roles when their
domestic circumstances permit. The facility to base such learning directly on work-
place activities, and thus to make development activities directly relevant to the
organisation, provides a strong incentive for employers to support such learning. In
addition, it would be possible to focus current learning policies on employees who
are conventionally excluded from workplace training and development.
For professional women who are being told they are equal, yet who cannot pass
the ‘glass ceiling’ through their own efforts, work-based learning offers an insight
into the organisational dynamics which are constraining them. It does this through
the use of critical reflection on practice to achieve what Argyris and Schon call
‘double loop’ learning. Such a process requires professionals to evaluate not just
their activities, but also the implicit assumptions underlying these activities. Once
assumptions are made explicit, they can be analysed and evaluated, and then chal-
lenged and changed if necessary. Reflective practice can, therefore, provide women
with a way of identifying the mechanisms of their disadvantage, and with the con-
fidence to challenge these.
The factors affecting many female workers, whether in low pay, low skill sectors
of the economy or not, are likely to mean that the wider availability of work-based
learning will not automatically lead to greater opportunities for women. However, a
situation now exists where it would be entirely possible to actively address the dis-
advantages experienced, and to develop a model of pedagogy which ‘is concerned
with the inherent connectivity between learning, social actions and socially just
futures’ (Wagner and Childs 2001, p.€551).
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Chapter 12
Educated Women in the Labour Market of Iran:
Changing Worlds and New Solutions
Introduction
N. Mehdizadeh ()
School of Law & Social Sciences, Glasgow Caledonian University, Glasgow, UK
e-mail: narjes.mehdizadeh@gcal.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 145
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_12, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
146 N. Mehdizadeh and G. Scott
It is not only in development theory that we see attention being paid to a more gen-
dered analysis. Gender and citizenship is a critical issue for social policy. Accord-
ing to Lister (2003) citizenship involves political, economic and social dimensions.
Whilst she recognises that economic independence, particularly the right to work, is
central to women’s claims for full citizenship and is always a precondition of wom-
en’s liberation she rightly points out that too often such rights reflect male educa-
tion and employment patterns. Her argument is that women’s participation is limited
by their care responsibilities and by societal beliefs about their role in society. It is
these that will prevent women achieving full citizenship. It is a widespread argument
within debates about women, care and citizenship in the developed world: it takes for
granted women’s now well established access to education and sees access to care and
men and women’s equal involvement in parenting as the key variable affecting eco-
nomic citizenship. It is an area, though, that needs a more nuanced analysis in the ME.
12â•… Educated Women in the Labour Market of Iran 147
The education system of Iran that provides the basis for women’s increased involve-
ment in employment was developed in two different eras: during the Pahlavi era
(before the Islamic Revolution 1979) and under the Islamic Republic state. Before
the Revolution in 1979 the Pahlavi regime used the education system to modernise
and secularise Iran and was seen as key to opening up employment opportunities
for women. Post-1979 the Islamic Republic focused on inspiring Islamic culture
and values (Babran 2005) with routes into higher education initially squeezed in the
some fields of study for women, only to be opened up again in the 1990s. In many
ways the situation of women’s access to education and employment in Iran is a his-
torically fluctuating one and one that is not always connected to improving human
capital for the economy. In the next few paragraphs these fluctuations are outlined.
Prior to the Islamic Revolution in 1979 the highest percentage of women’s
participation in higher education was reported as 32% (Farasatkhah 2000) which
mostly included the elite and middle class women in urban areas and was accompa-
nied by rising employment. Between 1979 and 1990, however, both education and
employment became more difficult to access for women. Post-1979, the Cultural
Revolution that led to the closing of universities,1 and the lack of experience in
decision-making, plus migration from war regions, the increase in the fertility rate
and social and economic problems of families impacted strongly on education as
well as women’s economic position (Alaedini and Razavi 2005). Women’s access
to education declined at this time despite equal opportunities being presented as one
of the ideals that the government pursued in their plan for the expansion of educa-
tion for women (Mehran 1999; Shavarini 2005). The result was a highly gendered
inequality in the labour force supply in 1989, a deterioration from the situation in
1979. This was further compounded by an increasing stress on traditional culture
1╇
In 1980 for three years universities were closed for fundamental and structural changes and
Islamization.
148 N. Mehdizadeh and G. Scott
and customs that demanded a secondary and peripheral gender role for girls and
women socially. These patterns overshadowed families’ and parents’ educational
preferences and even women’s own attitudes, behaviours and tendencies. Tradition-
al norms, culturally and politically enforced, produced a domestic role for women
(as wives and mothers), and girls themselves learned that some fields of study, jobs
and activities were not suitable for them (Bouzari 2002). At the same time as this,
shifts were occurring in higher education under the approved laws of the Cultural
Revolution Headquarters. These laws were responsible for determining “gender
standards” and limitations for women in the fields of agriculture and technical/
engineering (Farasatkhah and Mokhtari 2001). Separate quotas were often deter-
mined for men and women who wanted to enter the universities and in some fields,
women’s quotas were only 10–20% (Bouzari 2002). Indeed, they were reduced fur-
ther when quotas for combatants and handicapped persons and the members of the
Revolutionist Institutions were approved in 1982. Statistics show that these trends
resulted in further gender inequality in the supply of an educated workforce. Fara-
satkhah’s (2000) study shows, inter alia, that:
• Women’s share in the university student community fell below the previous low
of 32% in 1979 to 28.6% in 1989.
• The percentage of women students in the agriculture and veterinary medicine
groups dropped from 18.4% in 1979 to 4.1% in 1989.
• Female students’ share in the medical group dropped from 53.8% in 1979 to
42.5% in 1989.
• Women in M.A./MSc and PhD courses were 28.8 and 25.4% respectively in
1979 and 1989.
Since 1990, however, the situation in Iran has changed. In contrast to the 1980s, a
phenomenon of the 1990s was women’s tremendous speed in closing the gender
gap in higher education (Shavarini 2005, p.€332). The restrictions of 1979 to 1990
began to wane, women’s demands became greater and economic growth replaced
the stagnation for women of the post-war economy. This was reflected in women’s
gross registration rate in high school education increasing from 69.1% in 1988 to
90.9% in 1997 (Management and Planning Organization 1999). As a result, the
proportion of women graduates in high school education and pre-university period
reached 57.6% and 59.8%, respectively, in 1997–1998, more than that of men (Sta-
tistics Centre of Iran 2002). It is in higher education, though, that we see the biggest
change. Partly reflecting demands from women, the education system was reformed,
allowing women greater participation in previously restricted fields of study. Direct
limitation of the regulations relating to women’s higher education were removed
by the decision of the Ministry of Science in 1993 because of women’s ever-
increasing awareness and change of discourse in favour of their citizenship rights
(Bouzari 2002). The regulations forbidding females to study a number of subjects
were modified, creating more opportunities for women to work in different fields.
A significant consequence of these changes was an increase in women’s demands
for continuing their studies in the universities and other higher education institutes.
By 1997 49.36% of people applying for university admission were women; by 2002
12â•… Educated Women in the Labour Market of Iran 149
Table 12.1↜渀 Women’s acceptance into universities with educational subjects. (Source: Technical
and Statistical Analyzing Office 2002)
Year Frequency rate of women’s acceptance into universities compared to total accep-
tance (%)
Total Math- Experimental Human Art Foreign
subjects ematical & sciences sciences languages
technical
1995 40.2 23 56.2 41 44 51.6
1996 47.8 29.1 60.2 50.7 56 60.6
1997 49.4 28.7 61.3 54.6 57.8 62
1998 52 32.4 61.8 56.6 57.8 64.9
1999 57.2 38.5 68.2 60.6 59 73
2000 59.9 41.9 69.1 63.3 63.9 76.7
2001 61.6 43.7 71.3 66 64.5 77.6
2002 62.7 46 73 68 69.5 73
women represented 59.7% of applicants and by 2007 the figure was 62.8% (Techni-
cal and Statistical Analyzing Office 2008). Given this trend, it was natural that the
rate of women’s acceptance into the universities would exceed that of men’s. In fact
by 1997 49.4% of students were women and this rose to 62.7% by 2002 (Technical
and Statistical Analyzing Office 2002). (See Table€12.1 for further details.) Many
scholars such as Shavarini (2005) argue that:
One of the most commonly cited reasons for women’s progress in entering institutions
of higher education is the solid and strong Islamic identity that Iranian universities have
established. It is an atmosphere that has secured the trust of traditional religious families,
who compose the majority of the Iranian population. (p.€335)
The picture from the 1990s, however, is not quite as positive as it appears at first
sight. In the universities and higher education institutes other than Islamic Azad
universities2 women’s share in Masters’ degrees in 2002 was only 28.34% and their
share in specialized PhDs is only 23.53% (Statistics Centre of Iran 2002). Even
2╇
Islamic Azad University is a type of private university whose numbers have grown. By 1982
there were 73 such universities.
150 N. Mehdizadeh and G. Scott
Table 12.2↜渀 Unemployment and employment rate of graduates according to sex in 1997–2002.
(Source: Statistics Centre of Iran 2002)
Year Unemployment rate in total Unemployment rate among Employment rate among
graduates graduates
Total Male Female Total Male Female Total Male Female
1997 13.1 12.8 14.9 6.5 5.7 8.6 93.5 94 91.4
1998 12.5 12.2 13.7 9.3 8 13 90.7 92 87
1999 13.5 13.5 13.6 11.1 9.6 15 88.9 90.4 85
2000 14.2 13.8 16.5 12 10 17 88 90 83
2001 14.2 13.2 19.8 13.8 10 22.5 86.2 90 77.5
2002 13 11.2 22.4 13 9 21.5 87 91 78.5
more important is the fact that despite an increase in the number and statistical
growth of female university students recently, difficulties in translating such educa-
tional shifts into employment remain.
It is certainly the case that labour market entry for educated women is not
commensurate with their improved position in education. Unemployment figures
amongst educated women as a whole suggest that demand for the specific skills of
educated women is more limited than for those of educated men.
As Table€ 12.2 shows, the employment rate of female graduates has declined
from 91.4% in 1997 to 78.5% in 2002 and recent figures from the 2006 census
show a continuing decline to 56% in 2006 (Bahramitash and Salehi-Esfahani 2009).
Overall, the decline in the employment rate could be due to the economic condi-
tion of the country as a whole and the shortage of job opportunities for men and
women. However, a mismatch between education and current labour market needs
and practical skills, as well as lack of information about labour market needs are
more important reasons for unemployment among educated women in Iran. (Alafar
2003; Salehi 2002). Salehi-Isfahani (2005) argues that this is not due to bad choices
on the part of women but arises because a poor connection exists between what
students learn in the Iranian education system and what they need if they are to be
hired later. He argues that, in a situation where the economy is largely controlled by
the state and job protection rather than job creation has been a priority, education
is not contributing to economic growth and cannot provide a wide-ranging route to
employment for educated women. Per capita growth fluctuates with oil prices, not
education, and whilst education provides a route to a good wage and secure public
sector employment for some women, it is not currently providing the skills neces-
sary for entry into private sector employment for many others or indeed providing
the basis for the national economic growth necessary for job creation.
It is certainly the case that where educated women are employed it is predomi-
nantly in limited types of jobs in the public sector: in 2001 84% of women and 55%
of men with secondary schooling or above were in government employment, sug-
gesting that the skills they do acquire in education may be of limited applicability.
The statistics of 2004 show that amongst employed graduates, 65% of women were
working in the educational sector, 14.6% in health and social work sector and only
20.4% in other sectors while 28.8% of graduate men were working in the educa-
12â•… Educated Women in the Labour Market of Iran 151
tional sector, 6.1% in the health and social work sector and the remaining 65% work
in other sectors. Whilst these limitations in the type of jobs available to educated
women can be explained by the types of education and curriculum they engage in,
traditional cultural patterns and powerful structures rooted in patriarchy also cut
women off from the possibility of varying their fields of economic participation.
Consequently, women have encountered a much higher rate of unemployment than
men, even though they have developed their access to higher education. The rate
of unemployment for female graduates had reached 21% by 2002, a much higher
rate than that of men under the same conditions (Centre of Research and Women
Studies 2003).
So if, to reiterate an earlier point, there is no obvious limitation for women’s suc-
cess from the viewpoint of the Constitutional Law in Iran or no obvious barrier to
accessing higher education, how can we explain the higher rates of unemployment
for women, the more limited job opportunities and their lack of success at senior
levels? Perhaps even more important, what is the likelihood of change? Addressing
the limited and non-work related curriculum is one aspect, but the development of
clear government guidelines for change, redressing poor access to vocational and
enterprise training before and in work and exploring the need for childcare and
changed gendered divisions of labour within the home are others to be explored
below. These are important areas to explore as the economic and social position of
women continues to change in Iran and, whilst there are problems, women’s educa-
tion in recent decades has shown it can play a very important role in transforming
women’s role in the labour market of Iran (Bahramitash and Kazemipour 2006;
Taleb and Goodarzi 2004). If Iran is to benefit from women’s clearly established
capacity to benefit from higher education in a way that benefits the economy and
women themselves there is a need to explore whether trends do exist for further
change.
Shaditalab (2005) in her article “Iranian Women: Raising Expectations” argues
that: ‘Iranian women who have rising expectations are an accelerating force for
change in Iran’ (p.€54).
Can such expectations be realised?
The question of whether further change can occur and the disparity between
educational and employment opportunities for educated women be reduced is a
significant one if Iran continues to enjoy increased economic growth. In this section
of the chapter recent and possible changes in government plans are examined to
assess whether the changes identified in education for women are likely to impact
on employment and what factors continue to limit progress.
Government Plans
A major question here is whether there is an effective orientation and plan for gen-
der balance in the country. A positive answer may come by analyzing the contents of
development plans in Iran. An analysis of the Third Economic and Socio-Cultural
152 N. Mehdizadeh and G. Scott
Development Plan 2000–2004 (TESCDP), however, shows that the government did
not undertake the necessary tasks for removing discrimination, inequality and gen-
der imbalances even though there was, in theory, an emphasis on and specification
of a goal of equality. Indeed, the most important article concerning women in the
TESCDP, i.e. article 158, merely put a stress on family reinforcement instead of
considering the basic development of structural changes and providing women with
more employment-relevant support such as childcare. The result was that traditional
roles of man and woman in the family remained major obstacles for the develop-
ment of women’s participation (Management and Planning Organization 2001).
Nevertheless, in the most recent economic plans in Iran the top priority is
women’s employment. Thus, in comparison to the TESCDP there has been some
progress; the Fourth Economic and Socio-Cultural Development Plan 2005–2009
(FESCDP) includes an emphasis on the necessity of the development of women’s
participation. It is also apparent that attention is now being paid to the presence
of inequality, discrimination and lack of gender balance. For example, the gov-
ernment particularly pays attention in article 1113 of the FESCDP to the gender
composition of the workforce and this could be a very important point for the reso-
lution of unemployment of educated women. Other regulations in Iran, such as the
Charter of Women’s Rights and Responsibilities (CWRR), have strengthened this
with attempts at the multilateral promotion of women’s employment and by offer-
ing general guidelines. At the same time, however, the government emphasizes the
strength of the family institution and promotes a particular view of “correct” fam-
ily behaviour without fully taking into the account women’s need for work-related
welfare/support policies (Mehdizadeh 2009).
Examining the government’s role in relation to education for work related skills
is probably even more important. In Iran, it has been easier to invest in physical
rather than human capital. Oil revenues have provided significant income and the
state has been concerned with using that to develop services such as education and
health and to provide security through government jobs, particularly in those sec-
tors. The involvement of the state in encouraging new directions in education and
training relevant to the private sector has largely been limited to regulating pri-
vate employers in a way that gives security to those in employment rather than
engagement in economic development activity such as enterprise creation, work-
based training and subsidy for new types of employers. The result is that instead of
With the objective of strengthening the role of women in the society and development of oppor-
tunities and enhancement of the level of their participation in the country, government is charged
with taking the following actions:
A. compilation, approval and implementation of the comprehensive plan for development of
women participation, including re-examination of the laws and regulations, especially the civil
law, strengthening women’s skills in line with the needs of the society and technological trans-
formations, identification and increase of the investment entities in the employment-generating
opportunities, with attention be paid to the gender composition of the supply of the manpower,
enhancement of the quality of life of women, as well as promoting public convictions towards
their worthiness.
12â•… Educated Women in the Labour Market of Iran 153
This idea of the need for a more employment relevant curriculum, including sub-
jects relevant to the knowledge economy, in Iran is supported by a recent Interna-
tional Labour Organisation report (ILO 2005) which comments,
Skills development is critical for employability and overall labour market flexibility to
allow workers in making transitions as the economy enters into a new, competitive environ-
ment. Iran is faced with a large number of graduates and dropouts from educational institu-
tions without requisite skills for employment. (ILO 2005, p.€23)
154 N. Mehdizadeh and G. Scott
Table 12.3↜渀 Potential demand for skills development at different educational levels, 1996–2011
(in ’000). (Source: ILO Report 2005, p.€23)
1996 2001 2006 2011
Non-formal skills training at VET 208 271 192.7 164.7
VET at secondary level 327.1 709.5 1,150.5 1,163.5
Applicants to AA/AS courses 613.6 840.6 1,043.7 1,197.0
Total 1,148.7 1,821.1 2,386.9 2,525.2
In 2001, over 1.8 million probable jobseekers were estimated to require skills
training from vocational education training (VET) services. Potential total
demand for skills has been predicted to increase to about 2.5 million by 2011 (see
Table€12.3).
The ILO report is based on discussions in Iran from the end of 2002 to the end of
2003 with various government officials, employers and workers’ organizations and
NGOs as well as on thematic background papers prepared by ILO officials, national
academics and experts in the areas of the macro economy, labour market informa-
tion, skills development, small enterprise development, social security, social dia-
logue and gender equity. It highlights the need for skills development. Unfortunate-
ly, it also reports that whilst vocational education and training are given importance
at the secondary level in Iran the academic stream predominates in higher education
and where vocational training has developed that might address the skills gap for
educated women it has tended to be poorly funded and of poor quality.
Nevertheless, some programmes in the area of work-based learning/training and
continuing professional development do exist and open up some hope for improv-
ing women’s situation in the labour market. For instance, recruitment rules have
been drawn up by the government that specify training sessions for employees in
relation to skills development such as ICT, statistic, ethics, management and plan-
ning as well as subject specific training. Agreements also exist amongst some public
and private sector employers to collaborate bilaterally with international bodies in
running training and skill development programmes for staff and they are usually
the same for women and men already employed in the organisations. For example,
after a visit to Iran by high ranking German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) company
members and other delegates in June 2008, an agreement was set up to run train-
ing for women and disabled people as well as in ITC, entrepreneurship and new
and advanced technology. The number of vocational training centres for women
has been increased, from 31 in 1996 to 160 in 2006. Graduates have appeared in
plans: for example the Ministry of Industries and Mines apprenticeship programmes
for university graduates was launched 3 years ago in order to ease their entry into
the employment. According to this plan university graduates volunteer and receive
a subsidy for 11 months to work in industry and mining units. This programme
receives financial help from the Mines & Mining Industries Development & Reno-
vation Organization of Iran (Iran Technical and Vocational Training Organizations
Report 2008).
12â•… Educated Women in the Labour Market of Iran 155
centres were all closed and their functions were synthesised under a new format,
the State Welfare Organization (SWO)4. In 1980, with ratification of a bill by the
Ministry Committee, every factory was given responsibility to establish a nursery
if women employees have a minimum total of 10 children. Although according to
labour law (Article 78) employers are now obliged to provide childcare for working
mothers, this law still remains more of a theory than actual practice, because em-
ployers consider it is the government’s responsibility to fill this gap (Mehdizadeh
2009). Shortages of job opportunities could be one factor that limits the implemen-
tation of this law and the other reality which should be accepted is that employers
have the right to choose the employee. Given the importance of the state in directing
the economy the views of one senior government official, interviewed as part of a
study of policy makers’ attitudes to women and employment, is indicative of low
expectations of change,
At the moment the demand for jobs is high compared to the number of vacancies and
unemployment is high for men and women. When men and women go for the same job,
although they have equal abilities, a private company manager may decide on the man
rather than comply with the maternity period, feeding babies and other facilities that are
needed for women. Therefore, managers and owners of the company will decide on men.
The regulation should be such that the employer considers not the loss but the benefits that
women can bring to the business, and this should be implemented through the government.
(Mehdizadeh 2009, Mothers’ interview reports, no.€4)
Thus, it can be argued that if employment policy in Iran wants a smoother transfor-
mation of women’s role in the labour market and a better way to meet the demands
of educated women, expansion of childcare as well as work-related support (Mehdi-
zadeh 2009) and training strategies would be key.
One study to examine this issue in some detail is research carried out into child-
care and work amongst 547 mothers living in Shiraz, a large city in Iran, who were
4╇
The SWO’s main purpose was to fulfil the welfare commitments of Articles of 3; 21 and 29 of
the Constitution Law.
158 N. Mehdizadeh and G. Scott
educated to at least High School Diploma Level (Mehdizadeh 2009). The research
found that some 35.5% of the educated mother respondents who were not working
felt that “difficulty in childcare arrangements” was the major reason for not work-
ing and a further 17.8% of the respondents said “restriction by husband” was the
main problem. Despite high rates of unemployment, only 16.5% of the respondents
believed that “shortage of job opportunities” was the reason for them for not work-
ing. The majority of non-working mothers (80%) believed that availability of child-
care influenced their decision whether to work or not. In addition, the most common
reasons, as cited by the respondents, for leaving or changing their jobs, were look-
ing after children and family responsibilities. The majority of respondents indicated
that they had thought about leaving their job because of concern for the care of their
children. The major reason mothers reported for not working was difficulty con-
cerning childcare arrangements. It is not only access to work that is seen as affected
by childcare; 45.5% of working mothers in the same study reported that they had
thought of leaving their job because of childcare difficulties. As one mother puts it,
hours of work and career prospects are affected by childcare responsibility:
I prefer to work in an education authority because of their hours of work and holidays. I was
working in the Ministry of Health; I had to work during summer holidays too. I also had
to work until 2.30pm every day. … for the sake of my children I changed my work to the
education authority. (Mehdizadeh 2009, Mothers’ interview reports, no.€3)
Is it possible to begin to address the lack of childcare? In the main, it has to be said,
that the same research showed conflicting views exist of the best route to take when
it comes to the balance between family and work for educated women. One senior
NGO policy analyst, for example, said, ‘this is a duty of the government - for the
welfare of all and to create employment for women, appropriate childcare facili-
ties should be established at low cost and near the work place.’ (Mehdizadeh 2009,
NGO interview reports, Policymakers, no.€6)
Whilst another senior government official felt in contrast to that:
In our views of training and rearing we don’t want mothers to get far from children….
Expenses of that should be paid by the future generation. We want women to go as early as
possible to be beside their children. In the short term mothers think of the gain in income.
But in the long term their children are deprived of motherly affection and kindness. (Mehdi-
zadeh 2009, GO interview reports, Policymakers, no.€3)
In such a situation it is unlikely that the needs of educated mothers will be met easily,
and without a clear strategy mothers, children and the society may lose out on the
contribution that such mothers can make, development will remain subject to chang-
es in the political and economic context of mothers’ work and childcare policies.
Conclusion
This chapter has highlighted the lack of a close relationship between higher edu-
cation and employment. It has focused on Iran, where there has been a dramatic
increase in the number of educated women but where higher rates of educational
12â•… Educated Women in the Labour Market of Iran 159
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Chapter 13
Part II: Conclusion
Part€II has built upon the insights offered in Part€I in exploring gendered choices and
pathways into and within work. For example, Chap.€12’s reporting of limitations
placed on Iranian women’s employment choices within specific sectors, including
technical and engineering industries, provides an interesting international reflection
of the underrepresentation of women in SET careers outlined by Herman et€al. in
Chap.€5. Each chapter in this section has also continued the exploration, begun in
Part€I, of the interaction of policy and experience and the way these interactions are
crosscut by gender class and race. In different ways, from different cultural perspec-
tives and using different methodological approaches, the authors have addressed the
implications of differential access to lifelong learning opportunities in the form of
work-based learning for the way in which women’s economic participation is con-
structed and valued. All the authors have stressed the need for the work-based learn-
ing and skills agendas, and the funding regimes attached to them, to be responsive
to the changing requirements and circumstances of women throughout their lives.
In discussing the ways in which work-based learning is shaped by and shapes
identity, the chapters in Part€II also anticipate the focus on gendered identities in
Part€III. Graduate mothers in Iran, low-paid female UNISON members, NVQ learn-
ers in the care professions—all of these are gendered identities which inform choic-
es in lifelong learning. The next section takes up this theme in detail.
K. Thomas ()
Schools and Colleges Partnership Service, University of the West of England,
Frenchay Campus, Coldharbour Lane, BS16 1QD Bristol, UK
e-mail: kate2.thomas@uwe.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 163
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_13, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
Part III
Identity, Intimacy and In/Formal
Pathways
Chapter 14
Part III: Introduction
The previous section considered gendered experiences of learning and the work-
place, including the choices or lack of choices women feel are available to them,
and ways in which ‘choice’ is exercised. This section moves on to explore the
ways in which our gendered identities impact on ‘choice’, which itself is gendered.
The authors in this final section consider aspects of women’s gendered identities
which inform the formal and informal lifelong learning pathways they take. They
explore ways in which identities are developed by and through learning, work and
intimate family and other networks. Common to all four chapters is the develop-
ment of greater understandings of the gendered choices and constraints that impact
upon women’s lives, building and developing themes which have been interwoven
throughout the book.
All four chapters in this section draw on empirical research to extend and de-
velop arguments about ways in which gendered identities impact onto the choices
that are made by women trying to access lifelong learning, as well as the real or
perceived lack of choices. The research takes place in three countries (England,
Wales and Canada) but the findings have a far greater reach, highlighting themes
and issues that are relevant to a wider readership. For example, all chapters are con-
cerned with the gendered nature of learning. The first two chapters are interested
in vocational learning and its links to career and employment choices, including
through the vocational degrees which have been developed within the knowledge
economies of the developed world (Webb et€al. 2006; Spring 2009); whilst the sec-
ond two chapters are concerned with informal learning: Chap.€17 with the informal
learning which takes place in (feminist) not-for-profit organisations, and Chap.€18
with informal learning in the (not so feminist) women’s institutes. What all four
chapters have in common is the exploration of gendered informal learning which
is also constructed through differences of social class (Jackson 2003; Reay et€al.
2005), and age. Whilst none of the chapters are explicitly concerned with race, it
S. Jackson ()
Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning, Birkbeck University of London,
26 Russell Square, WC1B 5DQ London, UK
e-mail: s.jackson@bbk.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 167
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_14, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
168 S. Jackson et al.
is of course the case that race structures the experiences of black and ethnicised
women in places of learning (Mirza 2008) as does gender, social class and age.
The chapters all engage in a debate about the emotional labour which women
undertake (Reay 2004) and the networks in which they participate (see in particular
Chaps.€16 and 18). Emotional labour is about the management and display of feel-
ings which will support the emotional wellbeing of others (Hochschild 1983), very
evident here in the work undertaken by the early years workforce (see Chaps.€15
and 16). Whilst the accumulation of emotional capital that emotional labour re-
quires can occur in the intimate networks described in Chap.€16, as Chaps.€15 and
17 show it is also accumulated in the workplace and within sites of formal and in-
formal learning. Women arrive at the workplace and at their site of learning with a
pool of emotional capital which is spent to the benefit of others (Burke and Jackson
2007). Diane Reay (2002) suggests that emotional capital is not just gendered but
also classed although, as Chap.€ 18 indicates, in many ways middle-class women
undertake emotional labour in similar ways to working-class women.
Both Chaps.€16 and 18 are concerned with the networks of intimacy within which
women not only engage in emotional labour but also construct and reconstruct their
identities. What is clear from the chapters in this section is that women require
safe spaces where they can learn to re/construct their identities, including through
vocational education and training (Chaps.€15 and 16) and through women-centred
work and informal spaces (Chaps.€ 17 and 18). It is through the construction of
identities that educational and career choices (or lack of choices) come about. As all
the chapters in this section show, women—often bound into the work of emotional
labour—can find it difficult to develop professional identities that are not embed-
ded in constructions of gender and social class, as well as age. It has been argued
that the meaning, significance and consequences of gender in the workplace varies
according to the power differences which arise from the sex composition within
an organisation’s hierarchy. Nevertheless, this was not necessarily the case for the
women represented in these chapters.
Forming a link between the previous section and this one, Chap.€15 examines
work-based learning and transitions in professional identity through empirical re-
search which investigates women in the early years workforce. In particular, Carrie
Cable and Gill Goodliff explore the impact for women studying for a Foundation
degree in early years education. In doing so, they explore some of the complexi-
ties for women who are engaged in work that is both gendered and classed. The
women who undertake the Foundation degree are employed in a range of low-paid,
low-status and often insecure early years work (Colley et€al. 2003; Osgood 2006),
including childminding, learning support assistants and teaching assistants. How-
ever, in addition to the physical labour of early years work, it also involves emo-
tional labour (Colley 2006) and constructions of gender and class combine with
vocational education and training, carrying high costs to those involved. As Colley
(2006) demonstrates, emotional labour carries costs for those involved in early
years work not just because children consume emotional resources, but because the
emotional labour of early years workers is often controlled and exploited for profit
by employers.
14â•… Part III: Introduction 169
In their empirical work which considers gendered identities through early years
education and labour; however, Cable and Goodliff show that engagement in voca-
tional training can enhance gendered and classed identities, developing confidence
in a new professional identity. Participants are able to draw on their programme
of study, their work experience and, for many of those involved in this study, their
experiences as mothers to enhance practice. Although the work in which they en-
gage—both in their employment and as mothers—remains highly gendered, the
women themselves feel a stronger sense of a positive identity which can transform
their engagement with others.
Chapter€16 extends the discussion by considering gendered educational and ca-
reer decision-making in networks of intimacy. Like the authors of the previous sec-
tion, Alison Fuller, Ros Foskett, Brenda Johnson and Karen Paton also draw on
empirical research which is concerned with the under-representation of significant
parts of the population in higher education, both in the UK and internationally.
Their concern is with the ways in which ‘networks of intimacy’, made up of family
and friends, provides a critical context within which thinking about higher educa-
tion is embedded and constructed. In doing so, they expose some of the assumptions
which underpin much of the policy discourse on lifelong learning and educational
‘choice’. They show how conflicting feelings of ambivalence may be explained in
relation to gendered and classed norms and argue that having access to the different
types of social capital available through networks of intimacy is relevant to under-
standing (gendered and classed) educational and career choices.
This chapter explores the complexities of women’s lives as expressed through
interpersonal ties and intimate network cultures. The authors challenge the notion
of decision-making as an individualised process, and illuminate understandings of
gendered choices. In particular, they disclose the normative discourses associated
with female and male caring and economic roles, and the significance of these to
educational and career decision-making. In doing so they draw attention to the ways
in which women’s (and men’s) lives and choices are revealed through gendered
roles and network cultures.
In Chap.€17, Leona English moves the debate from formal to informal learning,
arguing that the informal learning sphere has been both under-funded and neglected.
However, she shows that informal routes to lifelong learning have been, and remain,
attractive to many women. In recent times, feminist non-profit organisations have
become popular and public learning spaces for women, and have enabled women
to engage with and actively pursue an effective social change agenda. The author
argues that informal venues deserve closer attention in the lifelong learning policy
agenda although, in doing so, she also shows that they are complex and contradic-
tory sites of power, knowledge and resistances.
The author draws on a Foucauldian post-structuralism (see, e.g., Nicholson
1992; Ramazanoglu 1993; Weedon 1997) to look at the intersections of power and
knowledge in the ways in which women engage in learning in particular sites of
practice: feminist not-for-profit organisations. She shows how becoming part of a
feminist community unit enables women to learn informally how collective voices
may achieve social justice, opening up previously unimagined choices. Feminist
170 S. Jackson et al.
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Colley, H. (2006). Learning to labour with feeling: Class, gender and emotion in childcare educa-
tion and training. Contemporary Issues in Early Childhood, 7(1), 15–29.
Colley, H., James, D., Tedder, M., & Diment, K. (2003). Learning as becoming in vocational
education and training: Class, gender and the role of vocational habitus. Journal of Vocational
Education and Training, 55(2), 471–496.
14â•… Part III: Introduction 171
Hochschild, A. (1983). The managed heart: Commercialization of human feeling. Berkeley: Uni-
versity of California Press.
Jackson, S. (2003). Lifelong earning: Lifelong learning and working-class women. Gender and
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Jackson, S. (2004). Differently academic? Developing lifelong learning for women in higher edu-
cation. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Osgood, J. (2006). Professionalism and performativity: The feminist challenge facing early years
practitioners. Early Years, 26(2), 187–199.
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Mirza, H. (2008). Race, gender and educational desire: Why black women succeed and fail. Lon-
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and feminism. New York: Routledge.
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October 11.
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class. In L. Adkins & B. Skeggs (Eds.). Feminism after Bourdieu. Oxford: Blackwell.
Reay, D., David, M., & Ball, S. (2005). Degrees of choice: Social class, race and gender in higher
education. Staffs: Trentham.
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Weedon, C. (1997). Feminist practice and poststructuralist theory (2nd ed.). Oxford: Blackwell.
Chapter 15
Transitions in Professional Identity: Women
in the Early Years Workforce
Introduction
This chapter explores the impact of Foundation degree study on the changing pro-
fessional identities of women, who comprise the majority of workers in the early
years workforce. Historically, the care of young children has been seen as the
(natural) preserve of women and as one that needs little knowledge and few, if
any, formal qualifications save those gained through the experience of motherhood.
The professionalisation of the early years workforce is seen as a key element in the
English government’s reform agenda for the early years and we consider some of
the challenges early years students face in becoming reflective and reflexive practi-
tioners within a strongly regulated environment.
Drawing on qualitative data from students, tutors and students’ work, we ex-
amine the role that work-based learning plays in students’ learning and transitions
in their professional identities. In our study we were keen to explore students’ and
tutors’ perceptions of the impact which studying the Open University (OU) Foun-
dation degree in Early Years (FDEY)—and in particular studying the work-based
learning modules—had on their academic and professional identity and practice. As
part of an internally funded research study we surveyed the first cohort of students
to study and complete the OU FDEY. This study followed up an earlier scrutiny
and textual analysis of a sample of reflective accounts written by this cohort as the
final assignment for the first work-based learning module during the academic year
2005 (Cable et€ al. 2007). Forty-eight students were sent a questionnaire, which
could be completed anonymously, and there was a 50% return rate. We interviewed
ten students who volunteered through their responses to the questionnaires. Stu-
dents were also invited to submit postings to an electronic asynchronous course
evaluation forum after they had completed the final assignment. There were 13
contributions to this forum; four contributions were from students who had also
agreed to be interviewed. Overall we felt this was a good response rate although we
acknowledge the possibility of bias insofar as respondents’ views may not be fully
C. Cable ()
Department of Education, The Open University, Milton Keynes, UK
e-mail: c.e.cable@open.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 173
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_15, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
174 C. Cable and G. Goodliff
representative of all students in the cohort. We also interviewed the four associate
lecturers involved in tutoring the module.
In the following discussion we draw on commentaries relating to the develop-
ment of students’ professional identities and in particular their relationships with
colleagues in their settings, other colleagues they come into contact with as part of
their professional practice and their fellow students. However, we begin by provid-
ing an overview of the development in the United Kingdom (UK) of Foundation
degrees, which have a strong vocational orientation and relationship with the aims
of widening participation in higher education, an element of lifelong learning. We
focus, in particular, on the introduction of FDEY for practitioners working with
young children from birth to 7 years and describe the key features, learning experi-
ences and expectations of the two work-based learning modules (an integral feature
of all Foundation degrees) in the OU FDEY.
Snape et€al. 2007) found that the majority of students were female, over 25 years,
and perceived work-based learning as attractive and a valuable component of the
degree.
Work-based learning is not a new phenomenon, especially within initial train-
ing and continuing professional development programmes for practitioners working
with children and young people. However the integration of work-based learning
into higher education courses for early years practitioners in the UK context has
previously been associated with the training of teachers, especially through Ear-
ly Childhood or Bachelor of Education degrees, and has often been referred to as
teaching practice/practicum with the underlying assumption that student teachers
are putting into practice what they have learnt somewhere else.
The new FDEYs are not aimed primarily at teachers or those who wish to enter
teaching but at the wide variety of other practitioners who support children’s learn-
ing and development from birth to 5 years: they form part of a government agenda
to develop a ‘professional’ workforce in the early years (CWDC 2006; DfES 2006)
and are now seen as a key element in the progression route to the graduate Early
Years Professional Status (EYP) (CWDC 2006). Higher education work-based
learning courses do not, therefore, form part of initial training but at the same time
they are not exactly continuing professional development. Boud et€al. (2001) de-
scribe them as ‘a class of university programmes that bring together universities and
work organisations to create new learning in workplaces’ (p.€4).
However, there is at least another element involved in work-based learning that
forms part of Foundation degree study in the early years. The government work-
force reform agenda includes competency frameworks developed for those study-
ing FDEYs (DfES 2001) and for those wishing to achieve (EYP) (CWDC 2006).
The associated assessment requirements influence both the content and structure of
work-based learning modules, the relationships that universities have with work-
place settings and student relationships with those they work with on a day-to-day
basis. The challenge for course providers is to ensure that the tenets of higher edu-
cation—including enabling the development of thinking, questioning individuals—
are not subjugated to the acquisition of a set of externally derived and culturally and
historically situated attributes.
Views about children and childhood are not static or universal and policy, pro-
cedures and practice are constantly emerging and subject to change and contes-
tation (Moss 2008; Waller 2005; Woodhead 2008). The challenge for students is
to develop the ability to balance the messages they receive relating to policy and
practice through government documents, leaders in the workplace and established
workplace cultures, with the demands of their study which is encouraging them to
reflect, question and explore their own ideas, values, behaviours and practices. Such
a critically reflective position ‘is inevitably risky—people who take this position
risk alienating others and being alienated from them’ (MacNaughton 2005, p.€202).
In work-based learning, learners and learning are viewed as inseparable from
workplace settings. Students are not in the traditional higher education situa-
tion (for professionally related courses of study) of applying a developing un-
derstanding of theory and research to practical situations (although students will
176 C. Cable and G. Goodliff
be involved in doing this) but rather relating their knowledge and understanding
of practice, and their own practice in their own setting in particular, to their de-
veloping understanding of theoretical frameworks and perspectives and research
findings. These courses attract students who are already experienced practitioners
and who have developed their practice through their everyday work and relation-
ships with more experienced others through an apprenticeship model of learning
(Wenger 1998). Some have pursued training courses but many have not. Most
of the students on the FDEY are women and mothers who draw on their experi-
ence of being women and mothers in their practice. Many draw on their mostly
implicit knowledge, beliefs and understandings but lack confidence in their ability
to articulate their views or understandings of why they do the things they do in the
way that they do them.
1╇
There are a number of job titles for adults working in early years contexts in England. Some
commentators would refer to these as ‘para-professional’ roles.
15â•… Transitions in Professional Identity 177
can mean that students pass through a number of different transitions, both personal
and professional during their journey.
In developing work-based learning materials, and providing support for stu-
dents studying at a distance, we2 have sought to enable students to explore in-
ternational perspectives on learning, child development and professionalism and
to develop their understanding of the historical, social and cultural influences
on developments in the UK. Our modules are also informed by socio-cultural
perspectives that view learning and meaning making as situated in a process of
social participation. Learning is thus relational and found in daily conversations
and interactions with others. Through situated learning (Lave and Wenger 1991)
in the workplace and the online discussion forums students can find that their
values, beliefs, views and practices are confirmed and validated but more of-
ten they find they are in a position where they are challenged and where they
need to accommodate new understandings and apply these to their practice and
relationships with children and adults. The active participation and process of
reflection that work-based learning offers has the potential to transform students’
personal and professional learning. Lave and Wenger (1991) highlight this by
stating that thinking and learning is situated in participation in communities of
practice where ‘…it [learning] is mediated by differences of perspective amongst
co-participants’ (p.€15).
Learning involves social participation and work-based learning provides oppor-
tunities for social interaction. Wenger (1998, p.€5) identifies four components in this
process of learning:
1. Meaning: a way of talking about our changing ability—individually and collec-
tively—to experience our life and the world as meaningful.
2. Practice: a way of talking about the shared historical and cultural resources,
frameworks, and perspectives that can sustain mutual engagement in action.
3. Community: a way of talking about the social configurations in which our
enterprises are defined as worth pursuing and our participation is recognised as
competence.
4. Identity: a way of talking about how learning changes who we are and creates
personal histories of becoming in the context of our communities.
Work-based learning modules thus can empower students to review their participa-
tion in their ‘community of practice’—be it an early years classroom, children’s
centre or childminding setting—to co-construct (together with the children and
colleagues within and beyond their setting) meanings and new knowledge about
themselves and the activities they engage in. Rogoff (2003, p.€ 285) argues that
‘mutual understanding occurs between people in interaction’. The process of par-
ticipation with others is thus agentive for the learners. We will return to this later
on in the chapter in discussions relating to transitions in students’ professional
identity.
2╇
The OU FDEY academic team.
178 C. Cable and G. Goodliff
Developing Reflection
The first two 30-credit, work-related modules focus on building knowledge, under-
standing and skills to support practitioners to reflect on their role in working with
and supporting young children. Students are introduced to Schön’s (1983) work
and encouraged to explore the distinction between ‘reflection-in-action’—thinking
on your feet and ‘reflection-on-action’—thinking after the event (Craft and Paige-
Smith 2007). These early modules are explicitly designed for students entering high-
er education and academic study either for the first time or after a long period away
from study. When students progress to the first work-based learning module they are
expected to use the acquired underpinning knowledge and skills—such as the analy-
sis of theoretical concepts, the organisation and articulation of opinions and argu-
ments, reflecting on their own and others’ values, and taking account of appropriate
conventions for academic writing—as the basis for developing their practice and
documenting and presenting evidence. Work-based learning involves continuing
interaction between their academic study and their professional practice in the work-
place. As part of the assessment process students are required to document and pres-
ent evidence against 12 core learning outcomes set out in the Statement of Require-
ment (DfES 2001). These are externally ascribed competences designed to create a
standardised notion of professionalism for early years practitioners.
The course materials aim to build on the notion of ‘reflective practice’ to de-
scribe a way of approaching their work that involves questioning why and how
they do something while they are actually doing it; the students are introduced to a
structured, four stage, Reflective Practice Cycle (RPC). Designed to support them
as they think about and question different aspects of their practice (including work-
ing with parents and other professionals; promoting children’s learning and devel-
opment; and promoting children’s rights and child protection) the four stages of the
Reflective Practice Cycle cover:
• Thinking about my practice
• Exploring my practice
• Reflecting on my practice
• Documenting evidence of my practice
One student considered that there were pivotal points or points of transition in her
study particularly in terms both of her relationships with parents and other profes-
sionals, and in how she viewed herself:
I think there have been huge changes, particularly [in the first work based learning mod-
ule] we had a questionnaire on communication with parents and other professionals and
that was a huge sort of turning point for me, I approached the reception class teacher and
the preschool leader and asked questions about how we communicate and how it can be
improved and I find that we have a much more professional understanding of each other
now. I am quite happy to speak to anyone involved with the children on a higher level than
I was before, so I feel more knowledgeable now. (Student 5, Childminder)
Childminders often position themselves as having lower status than others working
with young children (Griffin 2008). We would argue therefore that this quote from a
15â•… Transitions in Professional Identity 179
childminder illustrates how early years practitioners can view their own knowledge
developed through experience and practice in the home as less significant than that
learnt through formal study. It suggests that membership of the work-based learning
community endowed this childminder with a newly negotiated professional identity
(Osgood 2006b).
In working through the Reflective Practice Cycle three times students ex-
plore, and are encouraged to begin to articulate, the ‘hidden’ values and beliefs
that underpin their professional practice. Students are also introduced to a Three
Layer Model of Professional Practice. Like the metaphor of the iceberg which
Goodfellow (2004) employs (drawing on Fish 1998), this was developed to en-
able students to visualise the moving interactions between their day-to-day prac-
tice and how their knowledge, values and beliefs influence the ways they work
and their interactions with children and other adults. It is the hidden knowledge
that is not readily articulated—comprising values and beliefs, hidden assump-
tions and ideas about child development, culture and society—that it is hoped
students will be able to expose and begin to articulate with colleagues in the
workplace, with fellow students in the online forum and tutorials and in assign-
ments submitted for assessment. As Goodfellow (2004, p.€ 68) suggests: ‘It is
important to address hidden qualities and dimensions of our professional prac-
tice if we are to improve our way of being professional.’ The first three stages
of the reflective practice cycle—thinking about, exploring and analysing their
practice—provides the framework for writing reflective accounts of the pro-
cess of investigation. The fourth stage in our RPC, which involves documenting
evidence in a Practice Evidence File, also provides a source of material for the
students’ analytical writing. Goodfellow (2004, p.€ 64) suggests: ‘Professional
portfolios provide a way of not only getting inside practice but interrogating
those practices through gaining insight into one’s thinking and professional de-
cision making.’
The second work-based learning module, and final module in the FDEY, is de-
signed to support students in further developing their academic and professional
identities. It aims to encourage greater critical reflection about children’s care and
education and their role. The following comment clearly describes a transition
from the way the student positions herself based on her perceptions that others
view her (‘just as someone who works with the children’) to a view of herself as
an active member of a team—as someone who can contribute to discussions with
other professionals about support for children’s learning. It can also be argued
that academic study has contributed to the individual empowerment this student
feels.
Again I think it is—because I am more confident now in my role and having confidence
in understanding of theories behind things, I feel more competent and more able to talk
to other colleagues, other professionals, especially external professionals and I have been
involved with the educational psychologist and also more recently with a speech and lan-
guage therapist for a child in the class that I work and I think its given me more of a
partnership place with them rather than just somebody who worked with the children and
perhaps threw a few ideas at them, I now feel that we work together more on a team basis.
(Student 9, HLTA)
180 C. Cable and G. Goodliff
Refining skills of ‘reflection-on-action’ (Schön 1987) remain critical but the focus
in this second work-based learning course is the process of researching practice. By
undertaking the role of a researcher, practitioners investigate the ‘voices’ of children
in their settings. Developing a reflexive approach is nurtured throughout the course
to enable the students to become increasingly aware of their own influence on the
children, the environments they provide and their relationships with colleagues and
parents. Evaluating leadership skills and exploring and responding to change—two
crucial facets of the professional role and responsibilities of a senior practitioner
form the lens for these reflective investigations:
My childminding setting is now run in almost equal partnership with the children. I am able
to share my knowledge with other childminders, pre-school, school and other agencies. I
am better able to support, [and share] experience and ideas with my supported childmind-
ers. (Student 5, Childminder)
In the middle of a discussion with a Practitioner recently I realised that I was describ-
ing Bronfenbrenner’s theory and actually understood what I was talking about. …As a
Manager I have always had to lead the setting and the course has enabled me to be more
reflective and hopefully a more leaderful leader. (Student 10 in the online evaluation forum)
In this second work-based learning module students use research tools drawn
from the Mosaic approach (Clark and Moss, 2001) to investigate the lived experi-
ence of children in their settings. This approach to researching and listening to
children’s views encourages practitioners to view children as active participants
in their own learning and environments. Students gather data from four small-
scale studies in their setting that focus on the following features of provision and
practice:
• Children’s environments for care, learning and development
• Support for children’s personal, social and emotional development
• Co-ordinating and evaluating the curriculum for children’s care, learning and
development
• Promoting participation and inclusion
Again the emphasis is on students using the same framework to repeat an investiga-
tion in their workplace with a requirement to share their findings with colleagues
and critically evaluate both their findings and their colleagues’ responses. Students
are expected to utilise the analysis of their data from each of the investigations
in four critical written evaluations of their professional practice that they submit
for assessment during the course. An extended written account that synthesises the
evaluations of their professional development as they have researched the views of
children in their setting is submitted as an end of course assignment together with
separate explanations of the evidence they have documented against the learning
outcomes in their portfolios. Five students mentioned the significant impact that the
Mosaic approach had on their ability to initiate discussions and bring about change.
One said
It has been the single most significant aspect of the course for me. The use of Mosaic tools
and the theoretical approaches have formed the basis for discussions with my colleagues in
15â•… Transitions in Professional Identity 181
bringing about changes to my setting from the child’s perspective. (Student 11 in the online
evaluation forum)
The module is organised in six study blocks. Each block explores theoretical per-
spectives and wider empirical research associated with the practice features that
the students research in their workplace. During each of their four investigations
all students are expected to participate in and contribute to, time-limited, asynchro-
nous online, tutor group discussions and also broader ‘route’ discussions. Students
select a ‘route’ to follow through the course based on the age of the children they
work with and their role in the workplace. The tutor group forums are facilitated
by the students themselves, whilst the ‘route’ forums are moderated by tutors. Stu-
dent commentaries suggest that these online forums offer a valuable opportunity to
engage with, and be challenged by, different ideas and perspectives (Goodliff and
Twining 2008), thus contributing to transitions in their confidence and professional
identities. MacNaughton (2005, p.€ 201) highlights the ‘transformative’ nature of
‘learning with others to link knowledge and practice’ and to change ‘how we think
and act’.
The following postings to an online forum where students were invited to evalu-
ate the module contain many references to an increase in confidence particularly
in terms of students’ ability to reflect on their practice, articulate ideas and com-
municate these to others. For example, one student said ‘the course has developed
my confidence on looking at my practice more reflectively, and through the eyes
of the child’ whilst another student said she was ‘able to articulate and support my
ideas much better and with greater confidence’. Another student mentioned that she
had ‘become more confident as I have travelled through the FDEY and find myself
speaking up if I think I need to, being in a more knowledgeable frame of mind’ and
another student claimed that ‘reflective practice is such an eye opener…I have defi-
nitely gained in confidence and am much more confident in my approach to fellow
practitioners and other professionals’.
Participating in online forums also contributes to the acquisition of ICT
skills, another important aspect of students’ development in terms of both of
their academic study and their professional practice. It is an area where many
(although not all) students feel they have developed knowledge, skills and con-
fidence:
I think I am a lot more confident now in addressing ICT. I don’t shy away from it. Before
I shied away from any kind of ICT skills, in the classroom as well I would always say, ‘oh
no I can’t do ICT’ and I would actually think—‘oh don’t ask me’, but I think now I am a
lot more confident,…and I hope I pass that on to the children who I work with that it is
alright to have a go, it doesn’t matter if you get it wrong and I think that’s most important…
sometimes things do go wrong and sometimes you don’t know how to work things and it is
alright to do so. (Student 12, Teaching Assistant)
182 C. Cable and G. Goodliff
Developing confidence in their own ability to engage with others from a secure
knowledge base and through reflection on their own practice and the practice of
others enables practitioners to develop or enhance their professional identities. Hav-
ing the confidence to engage with others also involves taking the initiative to make
spaces for their voices to be heard and a willingness to take risks. As students begin
to recognise their own agency they can become informed active participants in deci-
sion making and contribute to change.
Professional Identity
Defining what ‘professionalism’ looks like in the early years is the subject of much
debate in the UK and elsewhere. The diverse profile of early years practitioners,
the variety of workplace settings, roles, resources and regulation that cover the age
range (Blenkin and Yue 1994; Moss and Penn 1996) has made it difficult for agree-
ment to be reached on what should constitute a corpus of professional knowledge.
Osgood (2006a, p.€192) argues that the notion of professionalism being promoted
through the reform agenda in early years in the UK context is ‘highly problematic
and politicised’ and that ‘the increased demands to demonstrate competence mean
that professional judgement is subordinated to the requirements of performativity’.
Moss (2003) argues that the training and assessment routes for the Senior Practitio-
ner role associated with the FDEY and subsequently the Early Years Professional
role, reflect a ‘technician’ model of training, in that they are based on a standards
framework and have nationally prescribed outcomes.
However, being a professional in the early years (and in a number of other con-
texts) encompasses more than just professional knowledge or a set of competences;
it also includes skills, dispositions, values and beliefs, the ‘tools’ of a profession
and notions of professional expertise. As Osgood (2006a, p.€191, drawing on Katz
15â•… Transitions in Professional Identity 183
1995) notes, ‘It is widely acknowledged that the nature of early years work demands
strong feelings towards protecting and supporting children and engaging empatheti-
cally with a child’s wider family and community.’ While feelings and emotion and
even passion (Moyles 2001) are generally acknowledged as important elements
within the field of early years they do not feature highly within the masculinised
constructions of professionalism which favour competences and performativity and
seek to limit both autonomy and personal agency.
Moyles (2001, p.€89) suggests that ‘professionalism’ is related to thinking about
facets of one’s role and that ‘it requires high levels of professional knowledge cou-
pled with self-esteem and self-confidence’. The ability to reflect on practice is an
important component in developing professional and pedagogical knowledge, un-
derstanding and practice (see Menmuir and Hughes 2004; Dahlberg et€al. 1999).
Developing students’ ability to reflect on their practice is a critical element in trans-
forming personal and professional views of self.
On a personal level I feel every aspect of my practice has been enhanced. I feel well
informed and far more up-to-date with developments in the early years than many of my
colleagues. (Student 10, Teaching Assistant)
I do feel that I am much more professional now in my attitude to my work…I am the one
that does all the reading and updating everybody on changes in policy, or any news that is
about to do with early years, that is kind of my job now at meetings and I will be running
our group soon as well and I am hoping to encourage people to develop their practice more.
(Student 6, Childminder)
The questionnaire returns in our survey indicate that 92% of students felt that their
study had enhanced their underpinning knowledge of relevant theory and research
to a significant or considerable extent and 71% of students felt that their study had
enabled them to communicate ideas more effectively to a significant or consider-
able extent. The following comment illustrates one student’s feelings about her own
personal and professional growth and the recognition of this by others:
184 C. Cable and G. Goodliff
I think because my confidence and because of the activities and things that I did on this
course, they seem to listen to me more and come to me more for advice. I mean obviously
I was offered this new job and that’s because of the qualification and the work that I have
done on this course and I think they listen to me more now rather than just someone work-
ing within the setting, they actually you know actually think that I have got something to
say! (Student 18, LSA)
Conclusion
We acknowledge that the data we draw on in this chapter represent the voices of a
small number of students following a particular form of higher education study—
work-based learning through distance learning. The data do not represent the whole
current student group on our Foundation degree or even the whole cohort of first
‘graduates’. These are the comments of students who continued through to the last
course, a minority of those who began their studies on the Foundation degree. It
is likely that those who chose to participate in our research were those who felt
they had gained most from their studies. Students were also asked about the chal-
lenges they faced and these included carrying out tasks in the workplace; the dif-
ficulties they had in collecting and documenting evidence of their practice; their
powerlessness in bringing about change in their settings; and the difficulties they
experienced grappling with new ideas and in preparing assignments. As women
they were involved in the juggling act that many women with family and domestic
responsibilities who work outside the home carry out when they choose to engage in
study. In talking about the difficulties and challenges they faced, most students also
talked about how they overcame them and demonstrated great persistence and re-
solve—including developing the confidence to ask for and give help to their fellow
students. Many mentioned the support their families provided as well as support
from tutors and course materials. The data have provided us with much to reflect on
in terms of how we support students who are new to higher education or returning
to study after a long period of absence, who lack confidence in terms of their profes-
15â•… Transitions in Professional Identity 185
sional role and knowledge base as well as their ability to engage in study at HE level
and who are working in a profession which is still viewed by many as ‘women’s
work’ and an extension of the natural mothering role.
Our study suggests that the content of the work-based learning modules and the
journey that we support students through has the potential to enable many of them
to develop a professional identity by the end of the Foundation degree—an identity
that is based on a strong specialist knowledge base in terms of theoretical under-
standing and the achievement of the externally recognised learning outcomes but
also, and significantly, the ability to relate and reflect on this learning and knowledge
in terms of their practice. The notion of a developing community of practice is use-
ful in considering what we aim to achieve through supported work-based learning:
A community of practice is not merely a community of interest. It brings together practitio-
ners who are involved in doing something. Over time, they accumulate practical knowledge
in their domain, which makes a difference to their ability to act individually and collec-
tively. (Wenger 2004, p.€3)
Many students in our survey talked about the development of their confidence in
communicating with their colleagues and underpinning this were feelings that they
are more knowledgeable, are able to contribute more, are more respected by col-
leagues and feel themselves to be more professional. This has impacted on their
working relationships and in some cases transformed the way they see themselves
and the way others see them. We would argue that until students have developed
their own ‘voice’ they are unable to bring about changes in their own practice
(through rationalisation of the reasons for the change) and in the practice in their
settings (through the ability to communicate the reasons to others).
The development of students’ confidence in their ability to communicate their
new knowledge and understanding to colleagues in the workplace and to their tutors
in face-to-face sessions, electronic forums and in their essays reflects the transi-
tions and journey students have made. It could be argued that for these students it is
about contesting, questioning and developing a critical attitude and about opening
up space to think about how it might be possible to do things differently—giv-
ing them the confidence to push against their own boundaries and boundaries in
their workplaces. For some students this increase in confidence has enabled them
to move from a position where they want to give up or change jobs—from feeling
disempowered—to a position where they recognise their own agency and how they
might bring about change in their own practice and relationships (the ability to act
individually) and even make a contribution to change in their own settings (the abil-
ity to act collectively).
I think my colleagues now understand that, you know because I have studied, that perhaps
I have a greater insight into what it is that affects children’s learning and perhaps, although
I am a non teaching staff member, I still have a knowledge and because I have studied
recently that perhaps I have newer insights than they have, there is something that I can
give that they can’t give, but also they recognise now that as I have studied and I have
that knowledge of theory base if you like, that perhaps things that I can give to them can
enhance what they do and I feel I have become a better team member for that. (Student 9,
HLTA) (italics added)
186 C. Cable and G. Goodliff
For many women working in the early years (and we would argue elsewhere), de-
veloping confidence is a fundamental part of developing a professional identity and
opens up the possibilities of acting collectively to define what professionalism in
the early years should entail.
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Chapter 16
‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? Gendered
Educational and Career Decision-Making
in€Networks of Intimacy
Introduction
In social network analysis it is social relationships rather than individuals that form
the unit of analysis. A key strength of this approach is that it prevents decisions
and behaviour being viewed as either individually or structurally determined. This
chapter draws on research1 that is examining the potential of network data to help
explain educational decision-making, with a specific focus on Higher Education
(HE) in the United Kingdom. The study is designed to explore the ways in which
‘networks of intimacy’ (Heath and Cleaver 2003) made up of family and friends
may provide a critical context within which thinking about HE is embedded and
co-constructed. The following discussion represents an early attempt to explore the
network of intimacy as the unit of analysis for understanding decisions about edu-
cation, including the decision to participate, or not, in HE. For the purposes of this
chapter, we are focusing on one network which we suggest is illustrative of (among
other issues) the gendered nature of educational ‘choices’ and transitions.
In focusing on the interpersonal ties between family and friends, we aim to avoid
the assumptions which underpin much of the policy discourse on lifelong learn-
ing (LLL) and educational ‘choice’ and which, for example, have been exposed by
critical feminist theorists (↜inter alia Brine 1999; Jackson 2007; Burke and Jackson
2007; Leathwood and Francis 2006). These include treating identity as fluid and
flexible (↜inter alia Bradley 1997; Halford and Leonard 2006); the individual in iso-
lation from gender, class and race, and decision-making as individualised:
1╇
The research is funded under the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council’s Teaching and
Learning Research Programme under the title ‘Non-participation in Higher Education: decision-
making as an embedded social practice’ (award number: RES 139-25-0232).
A. Fuller ()
Lifelong and Work-Related Learning Research Centre, University of Southampton,
Southampton, UK
e-mail: a.fuller@soton.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 189
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_16, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
190 A. Fuller et al.
Learners are conceptualised outside of social structures, without identities or subject posi-
tionings, and are seen as highly individualised beings within a neo-liberal model based on
deficit. (Burke and Jackson 2007, p.€14)
There is also the unhelpful and persistent policymaker error of using qualifications
as proxies for skills, knowledge and understanding, which leads to the ‘read across’
that those with few or low formal qualifications are inevitably poorly skilled (Keep
et€al. 2006). In a period where (particular forms of) LLL are being exhorted in the
policy discourse (e.g. DfEE 1998), there is also the danger that those not heeding
the call to engage as ‘responsible learners’ can be constructed as falling short as
citizens (Webb and Warren 2007).
In order to explore what new insights in educational decision-making and par-
ticipation can be gleaned by focusing on networks of intimacy rather than ‘the
individual’, we are drawing on concepts associated with social network analysis,
such as the strength and nature of inter-personal ties (↜inter alia Granovetter 1973;
Bott 1957), and types of social capital (↜inter alia Putnam 2000; Woolcock 1998;
Quinn 2005). We are also examining the extent to which structural groups, including
gender and class, underpin and are relevant to making sense of network data in rela-
tion to patterns of participation in education and work. Such categories are particu-
larly relevant given that non-participants are more likely than participants in HE to
follow traditional gendered and classed pathways into ‘early adulthood’ and work.
In relation to gender, we know that females outnumber male enrolments in
HE (e.g. Gilchrist et€ al. 2003). However, it is also known that the type of post-
compulsory provision, subjects and vocational areas in which males and females
enrol is highly gendered in Britain and internationally (↜inter alia Reay et€al. 2005;
Fuller et€al. 2005; Macleod and Lambe 2007; Peter and Horn 2005). In addition,
there is evidence that the pay gap between males and females persists (see, for
example, Olsen and Walby 2004). In relation to class, Gilchrist et€al. (2003), for
example, show that nearly all those from social classes I and II with HE level entry
qualifications at age 21 have achieved HE qualifications by the time they are 30,
whereas the proportion of those from class III (non-manual and manual) to V ranges
from just over a third down to under a fifth of the group.
The chapter is organised in five sections. The first section provides a brief review
of the research context to our study. We then outline our focus on social networks
and discuss the relevance of insights deriving from the literature on social capital
(Sect.€2). The third section describes our methodology and data collection, and in-
troduces one of our networks of intimacy. The empirical part of the chapter, the
fourth section, explores a variety of themes raised by the network, including the
extent to which the data are revealing normative discourses associated with female
and male caring and economic roles, and the significance of these to educational
and career decision-making. The final section offers a range of concluding remarks.
Overall, we suggest that evidence collected from social networks can challenge the
notion of decision-making as an individualised process and suggests the potential
of using this unit of analysis to augment existing understandings of females’ and
males’ educational ‘choices’ and transitions. We argue that a key way the data do
this is by drawing attention to the linked and conjoined nature of people’s lives as
16â•… ‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? 191
expressed through interpersonal ties and revealed in gendered roles, network cul-
tures, discourses and the structural positions of members.
Research Context
Our research is set within a policy context which is demanding new insights into,
and remedies for, the continuing under-representation of significant parts of the
population in HE in the UK (e.g. HEFCE 2004, p.€34) and internationally (David
2007; Thomas and Quinn 2007). Our project starts from two premises (a) that em-
pirical research and related debates in widening participation in HE have been too
narrowly focused on transitions at 18 and on the individual, and (b) that participa-
tion should not automatically be conceived as ‘a good thing’. In this latter regard, we
are in agreement with writers who challenge the ‘deficit model’ of non-participation
(for example, Jones and Thomas 2005). Research in this area has mainly focused
on those who actually enter or at least apply to HE (Ball et€al. 2000; Brooks 2005;
Forsyth and Furlong 2003; Pugsley 1998; Reay 2003; Reay et€al. 2005). Much less
attention has fallen on non-participants (Archer and Hutchings 2000 provide an ex-
ception) and those adults, particularly aged 30 plus, who fall outside conventional
age-related educational transitions, and recent UK government policy directed at
increasing participation in HE of 18 to 30 year olds (Fuller and Paton 2008).
At the level of individual choice, the literature across the social sciences has
drawn primarily on data at school and individual level. Various models have been
used to explain choice in such analyses, and while each provides some insightful
perspectives all have limitations on their applicability. Structuralist models (Ryrie
1981; Roberts 1984; Gambetta 1996) explain choice and decision making in educa-
tion and training as being largely constrained by socio-economic and environmental
factors, resulting in significant reproduction of social, economic and cultural capi-
tal (Bourdieu 1986). However, recent research on educational choice has provided
some support for the idea that some groups exercise agency in their post-16/18
educational decisions (Ball et€al. 2000; Brooks 2005; Archer et€al. 2003).
Approaches, such as Phil Hodkinson and colleagues’ careership model (1996),
emphasise the situatedness of individuals within family, institutional, socio-
economic and ‘lived’ contexts. Here, the role of young people’s ‘pragmatic
rationality’ is highlighted with choice being conceptualised as a path of least resis-
tance for the chooser based on changing and sometimes contradictory information
(Hodkinson et€al. 1996). Foskett and Helmsley-Brown (2001) argue for an integra-
tive approach that acknowledges the dynamic nature of individual decision mak-
ing in a changing environment and the relevance of multiple sources of influence,
including from: peers (Brooks 2005); careers education and guidance activities
(Morris 2004); school organisation and ethos (Foskett et€al. 2004); as well as how
race, gender, class and ‘institutional habitus’ persist in shaping individual choices
(e.g. Reay et€al. 2005). Recent cross-national research indicates the importance of
parental education on first-generation entry to HE (Thomas and Quinn 2007).
192 A. Fuller et al.
The aim of our research is to use a social network approach to build conceptually
and methodologically on the extant literature on understanding individuals’ partici-
pation decisions. Our empirical work involves interviews with social groups involv-
ing an individual (who has the qualifications to enter HE), our ‘entry point’ and also
interviews with members of her or his friends and family (network of intimacy). In
this regard, our methodology differs from studies on educational decision-making
which mainly collect data from individuals or parents and children, by acknowledg-
ing the potential influence of broader ‘networks of intimacy’ (embracing a diverse
range of ‘family-like’ connections and friendships) on educational decision-making
amongst older as well as younger adults. This strategy allows us to explore deci-
sion-making as an aspect of inter- and intra-generational networks of intimacy. In
addition, it foregrounds the notion of life-stage and the factors in people’s lives (e.g.
family and work responsibilities) which are perceived as differentially constraining
or enabling males and females transitions (Heath and Johnston 2006). Underlying
our interest in networks of intimacy is the idea that the relationships, and contacts
they entail, have ‘value’ and can shed light on the social context in which education-
al and decision-making are embedded. Including network members as interviewees
affords the opportunity to gain a deeper understanding of the nature of network
influences (Fuller et al. 2011).
The notion of ‘network value’ has been explored extensively: for example, the
economic sociologist Mark Granovetter discusses the nature of inter-personal ties
identifying the strength of the tie as depending on factors such as, ‘emotional inten-
sity’, ‘mutual confiding’ and ‘reciprocal services’ (1973). He suggests that a focus
on ‘strong ties’ is associated with analyses of bounded small groups characterised
primarily by the density of relationships (who knows who) and relative lack of
weaker ties to other groups and communities. Granovetter draws on empirical data
on how people find jobs to argue that it is the weaker ties which ‘bridge’ people’s
contacts to other groups and that this facilitates access to new opportunities (in this
case jobs). Schuller et€ al. (2000) point out that identifying (the degree of) ‘con-
nectedness’ as the key characteristic of social networks was the central finding of
Elizabeth Bott’s (1957) earlier study of family and social networks. She found that
the stronger the intra-group connections, the stronger the imposition of norms and
role expectations of members. This insight helped her interpret the way conjugal
roles were organised in different families: a sharper division of labour (into ‘his’ and
‘hers’ activities) was associated with strongly connected networks:
The norms – or the culture…of conjugal segregation are appropriate to families in close-
knit networks. If the family moves, or if for any other reason their network becomes loose-
knit, a new culture becomes appropriate. (Bott 1957, p.€219)
Fifty years on from Bott’s study, debates continue about how far traditionally
gendered divisions of labour in domestic and work settings have been overcome
(Crompton and Mann 1986; Bonney 2007). This is despite contemporary theo-
rising about social change which implies that trends such as ‘individualisation’,
16â•… ‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? 193
2╇
For an excellent review of the ‘genealogy’ and development of the concept of social capital, and
an analysis of its strengths and weaknesses, see Schuller et€al. (2000).
194 A. Fuller et al.
Given that the networks involved in our research are populated by individuals
nominated by our initial interviewee as people they feel close to and who they feel
are influential in their educational and career decision-making, we can also expect
the groups, in general, to be close-knit. Important issues for us to explore, then, are
the adequacy of notions of connectedness, social capital and structural categories
to explaining and understanding the collective context for educational and career
decision-making, including the making and remaking of network norms and dis-
courses over time.
We are also working with the sociological concept of ambivalence which has
been developed by Kurt Luscher for understanding intergenerational relationships:
‘that is, the observable forms of intergenerational relations among adults can be
socio-scientifically interpreted as the expression of ambivalences, and as efforts to
manage and negotiate these fundamental ambivalences’ (Luscher 1999). Applying
the concept to family ties, Connidis and McMullin define ‘ambivalence’ as ‘simul-
taneously held opposing feelings or emotions that are due in part to countervailing
expectations about how individuals should act’ (2002, p.€558). They discuss how
‘ambivalence’ helps them to make sense of the conflicting emotions experienced by
male and female partners in relation to work and family spheres.
From the perspective of our study, and the network discussed below, we are ex-
ploring the relevance of the concept of ambivalence for explaining conflicting feel-
ings in relation to work, family and gender roles and also educational spheres, and
how these might relate to gendered and classed norms (Heath et al. 2008). Bonney
(2007) also reminds us from his review of the quantitative data sets that social class
(as defined by the occupation of the main earner, which in the UK is still usually a
male) explains differences in patterns of male and female partners’ employment fol-
lowing the birth of children. This finding is also likely to be relevant to understand-
ing decision-making and patterns of male and female educational participation.
3╇
See Johnston and Heath (2006, 2007) for a detailed discussion of our sampling strategy and
decision-making.
16â•… ‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? 195
The entry point to this network is Joanna5, who is aged 32 years. Her father is a
mechanic and her mother a shop-worker. Joanna is married to Peter. The couple
have two sons aged six and three, one of whom is autistic6. They live in a small
town in an isolated part of the county. Joanna works as a part-time administrator in
the health service. She left school at 16 with several GCSEs at grade C and went to
college where she studied to become a medical secretary and gained a Diploma in
Secretarial Studies (level 3). More recently she has gained an NVQ level 3 in Busi-
ness Administration through her employment. Joanna nominated six members of
her network for interview.
The chart maps out the network and the characteristics of its members. In sum-
mary the network has the following gender, age, social class, employment, educa-
tional and life-stage characteristics:
• There are five females and two males aged between 29 and 50 years old.
• The network comprises family members (Joanna’s older brother, her husband
and sister-in-law) from one generation, and three of Joanna’s female friends.
• In terms of social class, two members described themselves as ‘working class’,
one as ‘lower middle’, one as ‘middle’, one as ‘just normal’ and two said they
‘didn’t know’. Using parental occupation as an indicator of social class, reveals
that all members of the network would be classified (using the NS-SEC 2001
classification) as class 3 or below. Using respondents’ current occupation as an
4╇
In the UK level 3 includes a variety of academic and vocational qualifications including A
levels, BTEC national certificates and diplomas and National Vocational Qualifications (NVQ3).
5╇
We are using pseudonyms to help protect confidentiality.
6╇
It was interesting that Joanna did not suggest that having an autistic son had had a strong influ-
ence in her educational and career decision-making. There was no evidence to suggest that having
a child with this condition had influenced the gendered division of labour in the family any more
than having children per se. We have therefore decided not to foreground the son’s autism in this
analysis of the gendered nature of decision-making in this network.
196
Friend Husband
Name: Susan Bryant Name: Peter Sharpe
Gender: Female Gender: Male
Age: 31 Age: 37
Lifestage: Lives on own, one child Lifestage: Lives with partner and two
Geographical location: Isolated rural children
Occupation: FT HR Manager Geographical location: Isolated rural
Highest level of qualification: Certificate Occupation: FT Building Surveyer
in Personnel Practice Highest level of qualification: Degree
Has experience of HE? Yes Has experience of HE? Yes
Friend Brother
Name: Jane Walker Name: Tom Andrews
Gender: Female Gender: Male
Age: 41 Age: 29
Lifestage: Lives with two children Lifestage: Lives with partner and two
Geographical location: Isolated rural children
Occupation: FT HR Officer Geographical location: Isolated rural
Highest level of qualification: Certificate Occupation: FT Water Process Operator
in Personnel Practice Highest level of qualification: GCSEs
Has experience of HE? No Has experience of HE? No
A. Fuller et al.
16â•… ‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? 197
indicator reveals that two members can be located in class 2, two in class 3, one
in class 5, one in class 6 and one in class 8.
• All but one member of the network (Joanna’s brother) achieved some GCSEs at
grades A* to C, and two females achieved A levels although only one proceeded
to university (one year after leaving school). Four members of the network (all
female) have achieved level 3 as their highest level of qualification.
• Most of the network members participated in initial post-compulsory education
and have re-participated in vocational and work oriented opportunities during
their adult lives.
• The network has experience of HE, with two members (one male and one fe-
male) having HE level qualifications (level 4 or above). The higher level quali-
fications achieved in the network are vocationally oriented. One female member
is currently pursuing a level 4 qualification related to her career.
• There is a mix of life-stages including: four members who are partnered with
dependent children (i.e. two mixed sex couples), two (currently not ‘partnered’)
females with dependent children and one single female with no children.
• The employment status of the network members is mixed: four are in full-time
employment. Of these, two are the male partners with dependent children and
two are the ‘unpartnered’ female parents. Two members, the two female part-
ners with children, are in part-time employment. One female is long-term unem-
ployed due to chronic ill-heath. All those in employment are located in organisa-
tions in the public sector.
Our interviews with network members have generated a range of biographical ac-
counts relating to the spheres of family, education and work, and which provide
insights into network norms and discourses. As the analysis below will indicate,
there is evidence that the network has generated a dynamic set of inter-personal ties,
the nature of which helps explain educational decision-making within the group as
well as for Joanna herself.
Analysis
For the purposes of this chapter, the analysis of the network data is organised
around two sub-sections: initial post-compulsory education, and subsequent LLL.
As the discussion will indicate, this distinction is associated with broader social
and institutional changes, which are reflected in the way interviewees make sense
of their educational and career biographies. The focus on initial post-compulsory
educational experiences reveals similarities between the interviewees and the ten-
dency to a ‘joint network’ account based around the theme of ‘standardised biog-
raphies’. The focus on LLL also provides some evidence of collective attitudes
and shared experiences, including between males and females. The collection of
network rather than solely individual evidence reveals the relevance of gendered
standpoints to understanding decision-making. In particular, the ambivalence
198 A. Fuller et al.
All members of the network come from similar socio-economic backgrounds and
none of them had parents with degrees. Most of the parents had left school at the
earliest opportunity. The majority of network members spoke about their families’
relatively low expectations regarding attainment during the compulsory schooling
phase and aspirations regarding their initial post-compulsory transitions. For ex-
ample, Joanna and her brother both talk about their parents as ‘good hard working
people’, but they did not promote the importance of education, associate educa-
tional success with their children or raise their educational aspirations:
…I know they wanted me to do well and be happy but they certainly didn’t think, they
never gave the impression I could do much more than you know…never ever discussed the
possibility of A levels or university. (Joanna, entry point)
…if you did your best that was good enough. (Tom, brother)
This experience was quite common across the men, women and families repre-
sented in the network:
They [his parents] didn’t actually discourage me from education but they weren’t encourag-
ing so consequently I drifted along. (Peter, husband)
There was no pressure to achieve anything, there was also no accolade when you did. (Gill,
friend)
As part of my job I do now I go to schools and I do careers fairs…and I’m like what do you
want to do…have a leaflet, because we’ve got all that stuff about all the different jobs you
can do. And I think if somebody had, had inspired me…it could have changed the whole
course of what you could have done, had someone just given me a few ideas you know.
(Joanna)
The network evidence is in keeping with findings that indicate the importance of
factors such as family background and experience of school to explaining pat-
terns of participation in initial post-compulsory and entrance to HE between the
ages of 18 and 21 (see for example Gorard and Rees 2002; Feinstein et€al. 2004).
The emerging analysis of the data collected in this case study resonates strongly
with Feinstein et al.’s (2004) conclusion that parents’ educational background has
a strong influence on children’s educational participation and achievement. We
would argue interviewees’ experience of post-16 transition is indicative of ‘normal’
or standardised biographies (Du Bois-Reymond 1998) for people from their social
background, gender and generation, and this helps explain the convergence of their
accounts. Gender expectations can be seen in terms of the subject areas undertaken
by the young women, who all entered courses and jobs typically associated with
their own sex. The following quotation indicates that such normative influences
started early and reflect inter-generational influences, or to use the terminology of
life-course theorists, ‘linked lives’ (Giele and Elder 1998).
My mum worked in secretarial, sort of similar to me…they bought me a typewriter when I
was about nine or ten and I think there were times they would say ‘oh you know, we think
you’d be good at this as well.’ So I think there was a fair amount of influence there. (Jane)
Lifelong Learning
It is striking to note the extent to which members of this network have participated
in education and training since their post-16 transitions and initial post-compulsory
studies. There is a strong link between their involvement in ‘LLL’, associated
awards, vocational development and employment. In general, members view quali-
fications as important for instrumental reasons, for example, in terms of gaining
more financial security, improving employment prospects and accessing more satis-
fying careers, rather than ‘for their own sake’. In this regard, there was an alignment
between the discourse of the network (strong vocational rationale in educational
decision-making) and the national policy discourse around the value of and reasons
200 A. Fuller et al.
Joanna gained a range of secretarial skills and diplomas at college before joining
the Community Health Authority (later the hospital health authority where she still
works in the Human Resources (HR) department). Since working in HR she has
gained an NVQ level 3 in Business Administration. Part of her job involves provid-
ing administrative support for employees following a range of courses. This experi-
ence has helped to ‘open her eyes’ to the variety of careers that are available in the
health service, particularly in the allied medical field (e.g. nursing, dietician, speech
therapy, and so on), and the diverse backgrounds of those pursuing qualifications
and new careers in mid-life. To put it another way, her employment situation has
given her access to bridging and linking forms of social capital that are challenging
her to extend her sense of personal identity, or sense of belonging, by seeking mem-
bership (potentially) of a new social group. Joanna finds the successful progression
of some work colleagues inspiring:
…I meet amazing people in my job now and I think wow. I mean we’ve got nurses qualify-
ing all the time and they’re in their fifties and things.
Joanna’s husband Peter envisaged that his National Diploma in Business Studies
would lead him into office-based employment. However, he ended up doing bar
work and studying part-time for an Accounting Technician award (level 3) but did
not complete the course through lack of interest. He then had a variety of jobs,
‘looking for something interesting’ including financial advisor, store-man, and in-
surance broker. It was while working in a timber yard that Peter realised that he was
interested in building design and construction and contacted Learn Direct for advice
on courses. He was also influenced by his male friends who supported the formal
advice he was being given. As a result, he undertook (while still working) a variety
of distance learning modules with the College of Estate Management and eventu-
ally attained a degree in surveying. He currently has a permanent post as a building
surveyor with a large public sector employer. Peter’s ability to access resources
through his interaction with Learn Direct provides a good example of the ‘linking
social capital’ available in this network.
Peter made the distinction between ‘career’ (interest, skilled, long-term, progres-
sive, higher status) and ‘job’ (short-term, for the money, less skilled, lower status).
He is happy now that he has a career and can progress:
It’s nice having skills that not everybody has, like a doctor or somebody like that…that’s a
good feeling, curing a problem or curing someone’s illness…. (Peter, husband)
The possibility of sharing an identity with those perceived to have careers as op-
posed to jobs was an important thread running through the interviews with Peter, his
wife and the wider network. As Joanna remarked, ‘he’s got a career now’.
16â•… ‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? 201
There are other similar accounts of ‘LLL’ in the network, characterised by posi-
tive outcomes in terms of achievement, enjoyment, improved self-confidence, ca-
reer progression and mutual support. For example, although Joanna’s friend Jane
left school at 16, she has pursued several courses over the years, including an A lev-
el in Psychology, training as a massage therapist and fitness instructor and through
her current job in HR, a certificate in Personnel Practice. She is also about to start
the Diploma in Personnel Practice which is a two year degree level course. As the
following quotation indicates, and like many adults making the transition to HE in
mid-life, her motives are instrumentally and expressively oriented (Fuller 2007):
I need to have some good solid qualifications to put myself in a better position and have
more earning potential…it’s my dream to be at a graduation ceremony and be the one who
has achieved. (Jane, friend and work colleague)
Peter commented on the encouragement he has received from family and friends on
his achievements as a mature student:
They’re really happy and pleased…they’re impressed as well, they think I’ve done really
well.
Such bonding resources were helping members to overcome a legacy of weak self-
belief and confidence in their abilities and provide a reminder that bonding social
capital should not automatically be associated with the creation of constraining be-
havioural and attitudinal norms (Thomas and Quinn 2007).
Following Henwood et€al. (1998), Jane Ribbens McCarthy and her colleagues de-
fine standpoints as, ‘concrete, materially grounded or shared experiences, socially
defined group identities, or collectively articulated political viewpoints’ (Ribbens
McCarthy et€al. 2003, p.€4). In speaking about her current life, Joanna identifies
and positions herself as a mother with dependent children and it is clear that this
‘standpoint’ is relevant to the understandings she and network members have about
her recent and potential ‘choices’. Joanna’s adoption of the maternal standpoint
(foregrounding the relevance of the issues she shares with other mothers of young
202 A. Fuller et al.
children), and the identity assumptions inherent in this standpoint that are shared
within the network (and sections of society more widely) appear highly relevant
to understanding her decision-making and her ‘horizons for action’ (Hodkinson
et€ al. 1996). This is illustrated in the following quotation when Joanna’s brother
normalises her primary responsibility as carer and its link to her existing level of
educational attainment:
Joanna’s very clever, she could do more but obviously she’s limited by, because of [son’s
name] she can’t, she had to commit a lot of time to him. (Tom, brother)
Since the birth of their children both Peter and Joanna, following periods of ma-
ternity leave, have continued in employment, with him maintaining full-time and
her changing to part-time work. Similarly, Tom and Helen (Joanna’s brother and
sister-in-law), also operate on the full-time male and part-time female earner model.
Helen stresses that working part-time enables her to fulfil the family’s needs: ‘I get
to spend more time with the children and I get to spend more time at home and do
things at home.’
Hakim (1996, 1998) has shown that post-children employment behaviour within
couples is related to gender, class and prior educational attainment and differences
in social values between groups. Data from the 2001 census indicate the associa-
tion between social class and gender, the higher the social class of male and female
partners, the more likely women are to be in full-time employment: women in mid-
range social class positions and without HE are likely to maintain part-time em-
ployment; those in relationships with males occupying lower social class positions
are likely to have the most interrupted employment trajectories (Bonney 2007).
Furthermore, survey data indicate that female graduates are more likely than their
less highly qualified peers to access high status professional careers and to con-
tinue in full-time employment following the birth of children (ibid). The pattern of
employment associated with Joanna and Peter, and with Tom and Helen, appears
rather typical for their class and educational backgrounds and the way this plays
out between male and female partners, and maternal and paternal standpoints. Fol-
lowing Bott (1957), it also indicates the worth of contextualising educational and
career decision-making within conjugal roles and the values existing in households,
‘networks of intimacy’, as well as the wider social groupings with which their iden-
tities are located. It is interesting to note that within this network, there was no per-
spective that diverged from standardardised expectations of maternal and paternal
divisions of labour and responsibilities within heterosexual, two parent households.
An analysis of Joanna’s interview reveals the sort of weighing up of the possible
courses of action that she might embark on to further her education and career. In
this regard, it seems to reveal the sort of sociological ambivalence that Connidis and
16â•… ‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? 203
McMullin (2002) associate with role conflict between male and female partners in
relation to caring and work spheres and which our data suggest encompasses LLL
too. Joanna concludes that she would like to develop her career and recognises that
this would probably involve HE but is uncertain about when, in terms of life-course
and life-stage, this will be possible or ‘appropriate’. One of her concerns revolves
around whether she would be able to study part-time at an institution to which she
could travel relatively easily. Given that the family lives in an isolated area where
there are limited options: ‘I’ve looked into things like that but they’re full-time
courses and there’s only a limited erm…, colleges in the UK, so you know it would
mean moving…and I can’t do that with young children.’ Ambivalence is captured
in her follow up observation, ‘you know maybe in time I would’ [undertake profes-
sional training].
Her husband, Peter, believes that Joanna could develop her career and attributes
her relative lack of progress to low self-confidence and lack of parental encourage-
ment. However, the following comment indicates that the gendered and normalised
nature of the couple’s decisions is also a relevant factor, whilst at the same time
hinting that there is the potential for change: ‘she could do more with education but
now she’s focused on the children…[she could do more qualifications]…in time,
yes.’
The influence of gender and life-stage and the maternal and female partner stand-
points are strongly evident in this network. For example, Jane, Joanna’s close friend
and work colleague, and mother of two teenagers aged 16 and 18, talked about her
shifting educational and career aspirations. She is currently about to start a Diploma
in Personnel Practice and in the following quotation links her changed marital status
and personal circumstances to wider social trends:
I think I had different aspirations then. I wasn’t thinking much beyond getting married and
having children because when my generation, that was how we saw our lives, that we’d go
and get ourselves a nice little job and then we would get married. I was married at 19…had
my first child when I was 22 and that was all I was aspiring to do. So it’s changed…I’m
divorced and the children are growing up.
The mothers in Joanna’s network are all in employment and keen to progress their
careers through the pursuit of higher level education. Consequently, they have many
issues in common. However, in contrast to Joanna and Helen, Jane and Susan (Joan-
na’s friends) are both divorced, have older children and are in full-time work. They
foreground the links between their partner status, developing their careers, increas-
ing their income and gaining some financial security. Jane’s comment is illustrative:
I’m a single mother, I need to be supporting…I think because I’m 41 now and I feel I need
to…have some good solid qualifications and put myself in a better position for more earn-
ing potential.
The above analysis has indicated that a key theme in this network revolves around
educational and career decision-making from the maternal point of view and the
gendered and classed identities and expectations that persist in relation to this stand-
point. Joanna’s ‘horizons for action’ have expanded in adulthood via the bonding
social capital she has developed through her marriage and adult friendships as well
204 A. Fuller et al.
as the bridging social capital she has acquired by means of the ‘weak ties’ available
in her employment. Joanna is aware of examples of working mothers who have be-
come professionals and who she is beginning to view as a group to which, in time,
she could imagine belonging:
I’ve seen a number of, loads of nurses that have been like NA’s, nursing auxiliaries for years
and they’re going to, ‘oh, I’m going to do it…train to be a nurse’…and off they go and three
years later they’re a nurse…I just really admire them. They both had children and…you
know…they do it, and I just think I really like that.
Concluding Remarks
This chapter has exposed some of the ways in which educational and career deci-
sion-making is embedded in, and can be understood in terms of the relationships
that constitute a network of intimacy. The empirical discussion has used one of our
project’s networks as an illustrative lens through which to focus on gendered aspects
of personal and collective decision-making. The evidence suggests that Joanna’s
and other members of the network’s earlier standardised biographies, characterised
by tacit decision-making based on gender and class expectations, have begun to
loosen up as awareness of possible employment and lifestyle options grows. For
example, two of Joanna’s friends (Jane and Susan), both of whom she met through
work, are both employed full-time and are seeking higher level qualifications. The
network discourses around lifelong and vocational learning, working hard, and the
growing importance of having a career are also pushing Joanna towards engaging
in higher level education and training. In this regard, she can be seen, through her
inter-personal ties to be accumulating ‘bridging’ and ‘linking’ social capital, as well
as ‘imagined’ social capital which is moving her towards new forms of participation
and belonging. On the other hand, the collection of network data has exposed the
normative expectations around gender roles and responsibilities between male and
female partners. These expectations can be interpreted as constraining factors, and
suggest that, to some degree at least, Joanna’s current life-stage can be characterised
in terms of ‘getting by’ rather than ‘getting ahead’. One of the interesting aspects of
the analysis has been to notice the ways in which gender continues to have an influ-
ence on ‘choice’. However, this effect is manifested quite subtly as members of the
social network do not express overtly stereotypical attitudes about male and female
roles. In this regard, they tend to indicate that their own views are more liberal and
fluid than those they experienced while growing up.
The extent to which the ambivalence associated with competing expectations
and identities will continue to feature in Joanna’s (and similar women’s) educa-
tional and career decisions is interesting: when (in relation to paternal and mater-
nal standpoints) will it be (if at all) the ‘right time’ for her to pursue higher level
qualifications, work full-time and develop a career; how old (independent) will her
children need to be before it is appropriate for her to pursue educational and career
16â•… ‘Getting by’ or ‘Getting Ahead’? 205
progression, what kinds of emotional and practical support would facilitate her tran-
sition?
In order to help us make sense of the network data, we are drawing on a range of
rich conceptual resources and writers who have grappled with how to analyse social
networks and interview material collected from people with inter-personal ties. In
this regard, we have found the literature on social capital helpful, particularly in
terms of distinguishing between different types and their relevance to understand-
ing educational decision-making. We envisage that our ongoing analysis of this and
the other networks will enable us to contribute to the relevant theoretical debates,
particularly in relation to notions associating different types of social capital with
positive and negative values (Schuller et€al. 2000) and the extent to which the dif-
ferent types of capital are revealed as distinctive.
From the perspective of our project, the overarching task is to try to understand
the extent to which network data can help explain educational decision-making.
To do this, we are trying to characterise the nature of our networks in terms of in-
dicators of the strength of interpersonal ties such as density, mutual confiding and
reciprocal services. Applying these to Joanna’s network reveals that this is indeed
a closely knit group that has a tendency to generate joint accounts in relation to the
value of LLL as well as in terms of what types of behaviour, in relation to education,
work and family, are expected from differently positioned members of the network.
We suggest that the emerging analysis points to the potential of the network ap-
proach to contribute to understandings of the social and relational nature of deci-
sion making and, in the case of Joanna, is helping to illuminate the role of gender
and identity issues in explaining why she has not, so far, participated in HE. As our
analysis of the other networks develops, we will be able to explore how the influ-
ence of gender plays out differentially for male and female network entry points.
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Chapter 17
Power, Resistance, and Informal pathways:
Lifelong Learning in Feminist Nonprofit
Organisations
Leona M. English
Introduction
1╇
‘Higher education’ is the term used in Canada to denote much post-compulsory education, in-
cluding trades college, university, community college, nurses’ training etc.
L. M. English ()
Department of Adult Education, St. Francis Xavier University, Antigonish, NS, Canada
e-mail: lenglish@stfx.ca
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 209
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_17, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
210 L. M. English
chapter proposes that we look more closely at such informal venues which often
help women make the transition to schools, enter the workforce, or become more
active citizens. Here, I explore these sites of learning as both complex and contra-
dictory, yet highly effective in facilitating informal learning at the community level.
Some cautions are in order. To begin with, it would be simplistic to read all
feminist organisations as holding similar views and practices of feminism, given
that feminism has many forms (see Code 2000). What these feminist organisations
do share is a concern to improve the lives of women through political and social
change, although how they do this varies with the institution and its members. It
would be simplistic, too, to do a reading of nonprofit organisations as good and
caring, and higher education as bad and rigid; or to paint informal learning as good
and formal learning as awful. Instead, a Foucauldian poststructural lens (Foucault
1977, 1980) is used to shine light on the intersection of power, knowledge, and dis-
course within feminist nonprofit organisations in order to further understand how
women learn and lead, as well as work for and against government, within these
organisations (see also Brookfield 2005; Chapman 2003; Dreyfus and Rabinow
1982; English 2006). Foucault allows us to look at women’s so-called preferences
and choices more critically and to view them for the complex and multilayered
events they really are (see Hakim 2003 for support of women’s free choices). As
Michel Foucault’s theory suggests, even benevolent organisations such as feminist
nonprofit organisations are sites of power, knowledge, and resistance. It is precisely
within this context that significant learning occurs, often because of the complexity.
Theoretical Underpinning
Several bodies of theory are helpful to this discussion. The first is Foucault’s (1977,
1978) poststructural theory of power and knowledge which is used to analyse the
learning content, strategies, and resistances (Hughes 2000) that are part and parcel
of this informal learning. Poststructuralism, or at least the Foucauldian approach
to it, allows me to look at the intersection of power and knowledge in women’s
learning, especially as it relates to their interpersonal relationships with colleagues
and board members, as well as to their external dealings with the bureaucracies of
government and the community. Michel Foucault draws attention to the ubiquity
of power and its refusal to be located only in recognised and hierarchical structures
such as government, the divinity, or the presidency. In particular, he acknowledges
the pathways of power that flow capillary-like through all our relationships, and
through our bodies, as well as the resistances that always seem to accompany that
power. He wants us to attend to the particularities of the familiar and how this
minutia is imbricated in each moment and interaction. It is within this minutia that
learning occurs.
Foucault’s (1980) interest is in the less overt and more political ways that power
is exercised (used, not owned); in this case it would apply to how women are creat-
ed as learning, activist and feminist subjects in the process. According to Foucault,
17â•… Power, Resistance, and Informal pathways 211
focus on women outside the official educational sphere especially in the nonprofit
sector where women are notably great in number. There has been some attention to
informal learning among women in technology (e.g., Butterwick and Jubas 2006)
and some on learning in nonprofit organisations generally (Sousa and Quarter 2003)
but none specifically on women’s learning in nonprofit organisations. This chapter
helps fill the gap.
Given that there are multiple forms of feminism—radical, liberal, critical, to
name a few (see Code, 2000)—it makes sense that not all feminists or feminist
writers have welcomed poststructural/postmodern theoretical frameworks. Marxist
feminists such as Mojab (1998) protest that in focusing on nonunitary subjectiv-
ity and fluidity, postfoundational theories undo the achievements of modernity for
women in addressing patriarchal systems that oppress them. Other critics charge
postfoundational feminists of stripping away notions of agency and unitary sub-
jectivity, of playing with women’s lives and negating material bodies, all of which
have been important to feminist’s struggle to unite against patriarchal institutions
(see also Butler 1994, 1999). Poststructural feminists such as Bronwyn Davies and
Susan Gannon (2005) take on the detractors, pointing out that feminist poststructur-
alism is not about taking away agency for women or denying that institutions exist:
The agency that feminist poststructuralism opens up does not presume freedom from dis-
cursive constitution and regulation of self (Davies, 2000a). Rather it is the capacity to rec-
ognize that constitution as historically specific and socially regulated, and thus as able to be
called into question. (Davies and Gannon 2005, p.€318)
It is precisely in the attention to the ways that women are regulated and discursively
produced that Davies and Gannon think women and feminism can be reconstituted.
This chapter draws heavily on Davies’ substantive work of negotiating the tensions
of feminism and Foucault. Like Davies, I am concerned with acknowledging the
ways in which women are produced as subjects and how they can effect change of
that production, so that they are not determined as subjects. I am concerned with how
they can create their own identity(ies) as knowing subjects, who are indeed agentic.
A third body of theory that is of use here is informal and incidental learning
theory (e.g., Watkins and Marsick 1992). A prime example is the extensive national
analysis of the incidence of informal learning in Canada, done by David Living-
stone at the University of Toronto. Building in part on the tradition of Malcolm
Knowles who studied informal learning in the 1950s, and Alan Tough who quanti-
fied informal learning in the 1970s, Livingstone’s (1999) research shows that 90%
of adults are involved in informal learning for work or for general interest, and that
the average amount of time they spend on such learning is 15 hours per week. This
is an increase from Tough’s (1979) finding that 70% of the 66 adults studied had
been involved in a learning project that they had developed themselves. According
to Livingstone, such untapped learning is problematic for those who lack creden-
tials or who have perceived barriers to learning. In particular, he found that ‘those
with self-rated poor reading skills tend to spend considerably more time in informal
learning activities than those with greater reading facility’ (p.€69). For Livingstone,
and for all with an interest in lifelong learning, inattention to this group of infor-
17â•… Power, Resistance, and Informal pathways 213
mal learners is very problematic. He notes that ‘the collective recognition of this
informal learning and its occurrence across the life course can lead to people more
fully valuing both their own learning capacities and those of other social groups’
(Livingstone 1999, p.€ 68). It can also provide higher education and government
with more accurate information with which to design learning programmes, as well
as to meet the needs of those who already posses considerable skills and knowledge.
Livingstone’s findings have particular relevance for low-literate and socially disad-
vantaged women, which the organisations in this study typically serve.
The interviews highlight the participants’ increasing knowledge of how they are
affected by geography, economic conditions, and social class. And, as Michel Fou-
cault notes, it is the differentiation of the legal, traditional, and economic conditions
which enable or bring power relations into play (Foucault 1980; Marshall 1990). In
becoming part of a community unit, the feminist nonprofit organisation, these wom-
en learned informally how a collective voice could be more effective in achieving
justice. Whereas individually some faced unemployment, or were underpaid and
underemployed, coming together in this local collection was a learning experience.
The organisation is a place for them to take stock of their own circumstances and
their shared plight. The nonhierarchical environment, participation in board deci-
sion making, and engagement in feminist activism often provided the impetus for
learning skills that might not have been otherwise available given their social and
economic location. Factors such as illiteracy, lack of employment, class difference,
and access to higher education play into their narratives. They also affect their key
areas of learning: learning to use resistance, silence, subversion and strategy to cre-
ate themselves as feminist actors and knowers.
Although half of the 16 women interviewed have university degrees, most indicated
that their learning about feminism and feminist organisations occurred informally
and incidentally through participation in the local organisation. They learned by
observing the daily operations, talking to more experienced members, participat-
ing in board meetings, and organising commemorations and events for women.
They learned about feminist participatory practices such as sharing in circles during
board meetings, using consensus to come to decisions, and participating in commit-
tees. The regime of truth in these organisations is that these feminist practices are
best practices, helping to further the notion of women as collaborative. Feminist
procedures such as circles and talking things through are technologies of power
that produce effects; they produce power that is not negative—it is in effect, very
creative (Foucault 1977, p.€194).
One of the key areas here is with regard to the ways in which women’s organisations
operate. For instance, on the surface they function in ways that are democratic and
participatory. For instance, the directors encouraged a participatory structure where
routine meetings are informal, often involving food and chat, and where leadership
17â•… Power, Resistance, and Informal pathways 215
is shared. Common is the use of a living room type setting where participants sit in
a circle intended to encourage conversation and sharing. Intentional learning activi-
ties are structured into these meetings and in the overall operations of the board.
Attempting to practice or enact equality, the directors want to help board members
learn about or be introduced to the ways of the organisation: how to chair a meet-
ing, how to apply for funding, how to organise a women’s event (e.g., anti-violence
protest or International Women’s Day celebrations). Given the particular structure
of endorsing informal learning and inclusion, talking about issues of power and
conflict in this research was difficult for both board members and directors/leaders.
For many of the board members feminist practices were new. In traditional com-
munity groups there is indeed sharing and cooperation but what was new was the in-
tentional effort to increase skills in self-reflection and organisation. Some had never
chaired a meeting or taken minutes before. An experienced director pointed out the
span of her learning: ‘I have been involved since ’84, kind of working on projects…
the learning experience is everything from learning how to engage with government
to understanding women’s oppression.’ As one director noted, we ‘come to deci-
sions though collaboration and negotiation’. Another pointed out they were able to
work through the issues because ‘it was all women on the board; women are less
inclined to grandstand or to engage in impression management’. Yet, for some of
board members these feminist participatory practices were not without their effects.
While directors were inclined to use the discourse of negotiation and consensual
decision making, some of the board members experienced this discourse as a tech-
nology of power that suggested ‘top down’ and ‘patriarchal’ ways of being. One
woman explained why she left after 5 years serving on the board. She noted that
she just gave up since ‘We had become like a men’s organisation.’ The woman who
left felt the power of seniority and position of the designated leader’s voice and
the undue influence of more senior board members (in some cases founders of the
organisation). The feminist pedagogical practices of group sharing and consensus,
not to mention collegiality, furthered and helped to reproduce the regime of truth
that women work together well. It also produced a parallel, albeit minor, discourse
of resistance among the leavers. As Michel Foucault (1980) notes, ‘Each society
has its regime of truth…that is, the types of discourse which it accepts and makes
function as true’ (p.€133). This regime of truth allows the nonprofit organisation to
run smoothly and produce educational and other opportunities for women. It also
produces resistances when women leave who do not feel they have been heard.
Feminism is a contradictory and complicated frame and only in being involved do
the women learn this. Women who are active in the organisations learn to negotiate
the contradictions, allowing care and conflict to operate as parallel regimes of truth.
For rural and socially disadvantaged women, one key aspect of learning is about
effective ways to be an advocate for oneself and others through lobbying govern-
ment (activism). The ‘effective ways’ constitute a different kind of activism than
the public feminist activism of the 1960s (first and second wave feminism) which
most often involved marches and protests. For 21st century women in a grassroots
nonprofit organisation, the activism often consists of silent, subversive, and strate-
gic approaches, reminiscent of James Joyce’s (1968) ‘silence, exile and cunning’
216 L. M. English
(p.€251). The nonprofit organisations being studied here were ‘tasked’ to care for,
advance and defend the rights of women, especially through promoting education
and literacy training. To support this work, the organisations needed to engage cre-
atively with government funders. The women were learning that a simplistic view
of activism as only visible protest, and of voice as only talking, is naive: Like Alecia
Jackson (2004), they ‘rely more on my actions and daily practices to disrupt the
category of…woman’ (p.€688, note 6). And, many feminists are like Jackson—they
are less concerned with making their voices heard in traditional ways and more fo-
cused on accomplishing the work of the Movement in strategic and subversive ways
through their actions and their daily practices. They also work to enable women to
learn and exercise voice. Yet, this does not negate the fact that some women do vis-
ible protest—the point here is that the women in this study learned that these are not
the only forms of resistance.
Much of the time in board meeting and in the regular running of these feminist
organisations is taken up with funding:learning how to access it and learning how
to retain it. When viewed through the lens of Foucauldian poststructuralism (1980),
silence becomes a micropractice of resistance to the funder’s (government) exer-
cises of power. The government exercises power by holding and controlling the
funds and dictating public policy around how the funds can, or will, be shared with
feminist organisations. The first specific technology of government power is in its
categories of funding. Government typically allocates funding to women’s organi-
sations through two main envelopes: ‘core’ funding for the regular running of the
organisations and ‘project’ funding for specific activities that must be applied for,
like preventing date rape and reducing teenage pregnancy. Government keeps core
funding to a minimum, which produces the effect of the organisation constantly
having to devise ways to get more, or even to keep what it has. If it really wants to
provide education to women for literacy purposes, it may have to strategise to attain
a long-term or sustained programme.
The opportunity to apply for project funding for special causes such as AIDS
and crime awareness, or LBGTQ safety training, is made available to nonprofit
organisations by government (e.g., Marple and Latchmore 2006). Feminist or-
ganisations apply for these funds complying with the rules of full disclosure of
funds on hand, and needs in their organisation. In bearing all in this confessional
practice, they appear to be meeting the government’s demands. Their written
proposals mirror the government discourse of management, executive directors
and boards of directors, a hierarchical discourse that they claim not to use in the
routine running of the feminist organisation. The power of government seeps
into the feminist’s proposal prose, yet they get the money and are, as one board
member said, ‘creative with how they use it’. Women learn to subvert these in-
fralaws of the state (not actual legislation but policies determined by efficiency-
17â•… Power, Resistance, and Informal pathways 217
seeking bureaucrats) by using the money for other purposes. As one director
explained, ‘We have no choice but to apply for what’s on the go. We spend
a lot of time filling out forms for projects but at least they keep us afloat.’ In
learning to keep quiet, feminist organisers can become effective challengers of
government, using project funds to cover core costs or to engage in projects they
believe worthwhile for women. They learn through networking that this strategy
of silent resistance is utilised by feminists in other jurisdictions (see Fuller and
Meiners 2005, p.€170) and it expands the definition of ‘what counts as resistance’
(Thomas and Davies 2005, p.€718). Silence, however, is one of many strategies
they learn to use.
The 16 women in this study are learning to be an integral part of the feminist
movement, that in its very existence is a resistance to bureaucracy, a way of disrupt-
ing smooth readings of organisations and those who work in them. The nonprofit
feminist organisation exists as a public resistance to state control over women’s
bodies—their wellbeing, economic security, and self-image. The organisation
pushes into the public sphere the discourse of woman, sexuality, and feminism. In
studying these feminists through power theory we see how they lend a gendered and
contextualised view to Foucault’s theories of power (see English 2006). They not
only perform resistance in observable acts and behaviours but also in their multiple
subject positions. And through participation and informal learning, the women in
this study became seasoned actors and protestors.
and all the men’s programs, we all got together and formed a loose coalition to ad-
dress these funding cuts which at this point they have, they’ve stopped.’ Subversion
becomes a technology of power that is an alternative to public protest. Feminists
learn informally and incidentally how to be most effective in dealing with funders.
As feminists they resist the identity that is ascribed to them (e.g., ‘militant, crazy
activist’) and they engage in a project of identity re-construction. Whereas the nar-
rative of subservience runs through the feminist organisations (one board member
said, ‘We take what we can get from government’ and another ‘we spend all our
time trying to find out where the money is’), there is a counter narrative also at
work there. These feminists have created yet another subject position: that of effec-
tive and caring worker, subversive feminist and community developer. One director
described her leadership as ‘trying to do what she can for and with the women in
the community’ and helping ‘women on social assistance get the most they can from
this system’. The latter is in sharp contrast to the government labelling of women’s
organisations as deviant social organisations. Traced all through the interviews with
these feminists was a reflexive construction of themselves as leaders and resis-
tance fighters, who, as one executive director put it, really ‘showed government
bureaucrats a thing or two’. And, for most of these women, learning a new way of
being had occurred gradually through active participation and not through courses
or direct instruction.
The visual rhetoric of marches and banners, which characterised early versions
of feminism, have been supplemented by a postheroic and postactivist stance which
is sometimes less visible, operating beneath the surface and coursing through the
veins of these feminist organisations. This is a feminist activism that resists the
government expectation of constant confrontation or simplistic compliance with the
policies of the state. In taking the masculinist government technologies of power
(inquiries, grants, competitions, etc.) and subverting them these women have be-
come postheroic and postactivist; they do not conform to the essentialist expecta-
tions of heroes (often military, male, and macho) or of activists (often loud, abra-
sive, and confrontational). Theirs is an activism and heroism of cooperation, link-
ages, and support (see also Thomas and Davies 2005), one which is a longstanding
dimension of feminist activities. One only has to think of Rosa Parks who quietly
refused to give up her seat, and of women’s groups such as the suffragists and tem-
perance activists who knew the importance of forming alliances long before it was
considered heroic (McCammon and Campbell 2002). This contemporary enactment
of feminism has been learned through trial and error and everyday struggle.
And, working in silence, as with most of these analyses of power, there is the
resultant spate of overlapping and competing discourses that these women have
learned to negotiate (see also Ford 2006). This study revealed a number of them:
inventors, creators, victims, militant warriors, subversives, and shrewd negotiators.
Here is how one veteran director described herself:
You learn…all on your feet. There was no manual to pick up. I mean even with our re-entry
program here, which we started about two and a half years ago, maybe three years ago.
When we started we had bits and pieces of information…. We had to invent that ourselves.
We learned together.
220 L. M. English
These discourses work simultaneously, sometimes pitted against each other, to cre-
ate subjects who are at times divided about the worth and integrity of dealing with
government in these ways. Yet, these discourses also work to create subjects who
are postactivist, who carefully negotiate a fluid identity to support their beliefs,
their organisations, and their causes. They have developed the capacity to entwine
discursive knowledge with financial resources, and the ability to decide how these
resources can be apportioned. Their ultimate technology of power is knowing in-
tuitively and otherwise that the capillary power of government is embedded in the
daily practices and decision making of their feminist organisations, yet they can and
will resist alignment with the state. Their resistance does indeed count as a source
of social change and becomes a useful life skill for them. The supportive structure
of the organisation allows them a safe place to sort out and live these contradictions.
It would seem that feminist nonprofit organisations not only have a role in keeping
feminism as a movement alive (see Ferree and Martin 1995), but they also have
a huge role in supporting and facilitating women’s learning. Yet, this learning is
largely undocumented and unacknowledged.
One of the key areas of learning that surfaced in this study is in how to exercise
power. Borrowing from Lesley Treleaven (2004) who has applied Foucault to organ-
isational learning, I note four particular ways that these 16 participants have learned
to exercise power and in so doing become effective, knowledgeable, and skilled
in practice. Power is exercised productively by them in the creation of circles, as
well as democratic and inclusive spaces for women from all social economic strata.
Power is exercised productively in creatively drawing on the available funding to
increase access to employment, further their literacy levels, and develop person-
ally. Power is exercised relationally in the way the directors and board members
work with each other to develop relationships and create lifelong learning spaces.
Power is exercised discursively through the organising and dialoguing that makes
the lines of power with government visible. Yet power is also exercised coercively
by government in its troubling of funding guidelines and practices; and within the
nonprofit organisations by feminist practices such as circles and coerced sharing.
These 16 participants are complicated multidimensional subjects, a view that a
feminist-Foucauldian lens makes possible. Operating here are power, resistance,
caring, and complicity, possibly all at once because of the women’s willingness
to deal with contradictions and to learn on their feet. As learning theorists such as
MacKeracher (2004) note, they learn through experience and from the everyday.
Consistent with the early learning literature (e.g., MacKeracher 2004) which char-
acterised women’s learning as caring, people centred, and connected, these women
do and did seem to learn in relationship. And they learn from that relationship that
not all women are caring and connected. In these sites of learning, they negotiate
the politics of their situation, not only with respect to government but among them-
17â•… Power, Resistance, and Informal pathways 221
selves, which is a dimension of learning not well developed in much of the wom-
en’s learning literature such as Hayes and Flannery (2000). The capillary power of
‘feminism’ affects them as does the operational power of senior members and of
colleagues. The women learn to push back, resisting control and enacting agency,
in short they exercise power and resistance, which are at the heart of Foucauldian
analysis. In a challenge to detractors of poststructuralism (e.g., Mojab 1998), these
feminists are actually able to see how they have been constituted by social and po-
litical factors, and to reconstitute themselves as knowing subjects.
Yet, like the people in David Livingstone’s (1999) study, as well as in Watkins
and Marsick’s (1992), the women’s learning is largely undocumented and unac-
knowledged. Through technologies of power—silence, strategy, subversion—they
have resisted the regime of truth produced by government and perpetuated by high-
er education officials and faculty that only higher education can educate. Through
their resistances they produce the truth effect that learning can indeed occur in the
community and that it can be valuable. Their varied micropractice draw attention to
the many women in the community who do not have access to credentials and yet
who have experienced lifelong learning in a very real and effective way. Learning
can indeed happen within a nonprofit organisation: studies such as this one open the
possibility that this informal learning can be documented and recognised in some
way.
These participants have a great deal to teach higher education about what counts
as learning. Not only are women learning in these nonprofit organisations but their
very presence and influence in them serves to change traditional notions of bona
fide learning communities as well as government policies on fundable learning pro-
viders. Some of the women who are active in women’s centres, for instance, have
been excluded from traditional places of learning because of illiteracy, financial
exigency and social class, factors that Benseman (2005) and McGivney (1993) have
highlighted. Community based nonprofit centres for women provide an alternative
education as well as a rallying point for activism around funding policies for areas
such as literacy and preemployment training. In lobbying for change, women in
these centres provide social and political support for other women. They gain con-
fidence and skills that help them can potentially help them cross the class divide
into higher education (McGivney 1990, 2001). For those who already have a post-
secondary education, their new learning can help them assist other women, increase
their own job opportunities, and advance the cause of women generally.
Given the uniquely feminist orientation of each of the nonprofit organisations
from which these women come, they are forced to deal with issues of power and
resistance. By their very mandate of addressing political issues that affect women,
these nonprofit organisations are in a unique position to foster learning in chal-
lenging areas that other community based organisations such as the Red Cross or
craft associations might not have to grapple with in a direct way. A stated feminist
perspective means that their learning has indeed been challenging and has forced
introspection and critique, and increased the participants’ ability to be active par-
ticipants in civil society. This is a unique contribution that these organisations make
to learning.
222 L. M. English
In some cases these women will pursue higher education, and if not them, then
the clients that they are serving through the nonprofit organisation. Women in their
literacy programmes for instance, might register for community college or employ-
ment training. Even with a PLAR (prior learning assessment and recognition) process
in place, though, much of their experiential learning about power, bureaucracy and
feminism will not be valued, further enforcing the patriarchal nature of higher educa-
tion and the discourse of government which sanctions only formal learning. Studies
such as this one challenge such a narrow view. Educators can look to what happened
here to see how these women defy stereotypes of female learners, how they challenge
the norms of caring and connected knowers yet at the same time value a generally
noncompetitive space to work out their differences. This study suggests that it is
precisely because they are female knowers who value community and emotionally
supportive environments, lauded by feminist learning theorists such as MacKeracher
(2004) and Belenky et€al. (1986), that they manage to learn all they do. In the ab-
sence of the bottom-line agenda that drives commercial organisations, they have safe
spaces within which to practice strategies of resistance and to try out new ideas.
The data here may also be helpful in changing how government funders might
see feminist nonprofit organisations. The feminist nonprofit organisations may in-
deed be useful conversational partners in the funding and education drama and may
be sites for more training programmes and preemployment initiatives. Government
and higher education might become more open to recognise women’s informal ac-
quisition of skills and knowledge such as community building, organisational skills,
activist skills, funding strategies, feminism, conflict, power, and negotiation. Per-
haps more threatening for government might be the women’s learned expertise in
resistance to funder pressures, their strategic forms of protest, and in the ability to
negotiate conflict and to exercise their own power.
The women in this study have moved outside the homeplace and have chosen
the in-between informal venue of women’s organisations as their learning space.
Nowhere is this activism more apparent than in attempts to garner and protect edu-
cational and training funding for women’s education programmes, whether oriented
to literacy, anti-violence education or positive space training. Yet, for all the heroic
celebration of these women’s lives and learning, I would hasten to add a caution. Al-
though they resist, these women are not always in a place of full choice or control.
As Davies and Gannon (2005) point out, their agency is not in protesting evil insti-
tutions or standing outside them. Their strength and agency are in recognising how
they are affected and effected as subjects through their encounters. So Catherine
Hakim’s (2003) notion of the independent women making clear-cut decisions on
careers or employment (preferences, in her terms) apart from their ‘discursive
regimes and regulatory frameworks’ (Davies and Gannon 2005, p.€318) does not
necessarily apply here. This study shows that women’s choices are affected by the
interplay of power, discourse, and resistance among the various actors in the non-
profit sphere. It is within the nonprofit organisation with multiple competing dis-
courses that they are constituted as knowing subjects capable of being and acting.
The lines of power make choices and resistances far more complex and difficult to
trace than merely saying yes or no to an array of options. Yet, within this situation they
engage in multiple forms of learning that contribute to feminist activism and agency.
17â•… Power, Resistance, and Informal pathways 223
Conclusion
This chapter has looked at some of the ways in which feminist nonprofit organisa-
tions serve to nurture informal learning for women. They appear to provide spaces
where women can be initiated into funding and negotiating strategies, learn from
each other, and become more aware of the political dimensions of caring for wom-
en. These nonprofit centres function as incubators of new ways of being feminist
and of actively creating one’s own subject position(s).
This chapter attempts to further the development of a more critical body of litera-
ture on women and informal learning, by using the insights of poststructuralism and
gender and learning. By focusing on specific informal sites and instances in which
women gather to learn we can uncover women’s everyday learning practices, and
critically reflect on them. This enables us to know better how we can support wom-
en and encourage their learning processes inside and outside official institutions.
In the spirit of Alecia Jackson (2004), this chapter has disrupted categories of
totalitarian government bureaucracy and powerless and victimised women, and
shown how feminist’s daily practices work to interrupt labels and essentialist views
of learning as occurring only in formal postcompulsory education.
Acknowledgement╇ The author would like to acknowledge the research assistance of Nicole
Woodman Harvey in carrying out this study. This study was supported by a Social Science and
Humanities Research Council grant.
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Chapter 18
Lifelong Learning in Later Years: Choices
and€Constraints for Older Women
Introduction
In this chapter we examine some of the choices and constraints for older women in
accessing learning in later years. We illustrate the types of learning with which older
women participate as well as the choices open to them, although we also question
the reality of ‘choice’, even for a group of seemingly more privileged women, as we
discuss below. The chapter explores something of the aspirations of older women
learners through drawing on key findings of a research project which examined
lifelong learning and the Women’s Institutes in England and Wales1 (see below),
although we show implications for older women learners that move beyond specific
institutions and national boundaries.
The research was conducted with members of the National Federation of Wom-
en’s Institutes (NFWI) in England and Wales. The NFWI is the largest organisation
for women in the UK with a membership of over 200,000, and is largely although
not entirely located in rural areas. Its mission is to educate women to enable them
to provide an effective role in the community and to expand their horizons so that
they are able to develop and pass on important skills. The majority of its members
are over the age of 50. The NFWI is organised through a network of regional Fed-
erations with local Institutes which enable informal learning opportunities to take
place. In addition, a wide variety of courses are delivered at Denman (the NFWI’s
residential college) where women participate in a range of learning activities.
The research methods used in the study were largely qualitative with the use of
focus groups and one to one interviews. A total of 11 interviews were conducted
with NFWI officers (including at Denman College) and Women’s Institutes Advis-
1╇
ESRC RES-000-22-1441 (2005). Learning citizenship: lifelong learning, community and the
Women’s Institutes.
J. Etienne ()
School for Policy Studies, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
Department for Social Policy and€Education, Birkbeck, University of London, London, UK
e-mail: j.etienne@bbk.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 227
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_18, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
228 J. Etienne and S. Jackson
ers, and15 focus groups were held involving members from 24 local Women’s In-
stitutes (WI). We transcribed and analysed all tape-recorded interviews. The various
quotations which feature throughout this chapter are samples from across a total of
26 of the transcripts. The local institutes were selected from five NFWI Federations
from a cross section of rural and urban areas of England and Wales:
• The largest Federation, with 248 institutes and 9,500 members, covering a large
geographical area from the industrial south-east of England to rural villages
• A Federation in a sparsely populated region, mainly consisting of rural farmlands
and market towns, although it includes an affluent spa town and has a total of 101
institutes
• One of the smallest Federations, with 33 institutes, covering a largely urban area,
including institutes in socially and ethnically diverse communities
• A Federation with 45 institutes in ethnically diverse towns and a range of vil-
lages in the North of England
• A Federation in Wales with 95 institutes and almost 4,000 members, covering a
diverse geographical area, from a major city of Cardiff to the rural Welsh valleys
Drawing on the data collected and analysed, the chapter begins by considering the
repercussions of discourses and policies which describe lifelong learning as a so-
cial and/or individual responsibility, exploring the connections between lifelong
learning and active citizenship. It moves on to outline issues of identity, learning
and community for older women. The chapter considers the wider consequences
of women only learning environments and the implications of funding cuts in a
climate of financial insecurity and within an increasingly ageing society. The in-
terview data demonstrates the hurdles and obstacles to learning faced by women at
a particular stage in the life course: older age2. Although the women in this study
are in the main privileged, white, educated and middle class3, the paper concludes
that very little learning choices exist for them, demonstrating that opportunities for
‘lifelong’ learning severely decrease for older people.
Lifelong learning policies have risen to prominence in recent years, and are high
on the educational, economic and social agendas of many governments (including
in the UK, elsewhere in Europe, North America and Australia) as well as of in-
ternational organisations such as the OECD, UNESCO and the World Bank. Cur-
rent discourses and policies show two major and sometimes conflicting messages.
2╇
We recognise that in many ways ‘older age’ is a meaningless term covering a wide range across
the lifecourse. A little over 75% of the women in this study were aged 65 and over.
3╇
Whilst we recognise that both ‘race’ and ‘social class’ are contested categories, this was defined
either by the women themselves, who were asked to state their ethnicity and social class, or (where
social class was not stated) in relation to educational backgrounds and occupations.
18â•… Lifelong Learning in Later Years 229
On the one hand, therefore, lifelong learning has become the responsibility of
all individuals, on whom it is incumbent to engage in learning throughout their
(working) lives. It is for us all to grasp opportunities offered and to continue to
improve ourselves. On the other hand, learning—including learning for work and
to ensure social cohesion—is too important to be left to individuals, and requires
state intervention. However, where there are no concerns about learning for work
or about learning for social cohesion—as is the case with regard to older wom-
en—then the state no longer feels a need to explicitly intervene. Nevertheless,
as we will go on to show, intervention takes many forms and cuts in funding for
some types of learning, including the informal learning with which many older
women engage, is another type of intervention. Although rarely explicit ‘policies
and practices of lifelong learning, in very different contexts and with different
groups of learners, are gendered in their construction and effects’ (Leathwood and
Francis 2006, p.€2).
Although there has been much evidence (see, e.g. the work of the Centre for the
Wider Benefits of Learning4) that learning brings better health and an increased
sense of wellbeing for older learners, these groups are not seen as a priority. Neither
is there recognition that older citizens can and do remain active and can positively
contribute to the social wellbeing of a nation. Whilst a lifelong learning agenda
should impact on all individuals throughout their lives, the reality is that it is in-
creasingly geared towards employment and vocational learning for those between
18 and 30. Kamler (2006) argues that the current emphasis on people learning
‘throughout their lives’ clearly appears to mean ‘working lives’, whilst Jackson
(2005) demonstrates that even if older learners are included in the rhetoric of life-
long learning they are not always part of the reality.
What counts as learning is highly contested (Burke and Jackson 2007) and the
(mainly) informal learning undertaken by older learners is rarely acknowledged and
almost never supported by governments, including those in Europe, North America
and Australia. In her work on older learners and lifelong learning, Barbara Kamler
asks how we use the knowledge accumulated over a lifetime in ways that benefit
not only the learner—the older person—but the society in which they have lived
(Kamler 2006, p.€162). Informal learning in particular acknowledges and values the
extensive life experiences that older individuals have to offer both with regard to
4╇
See http://www.learningbenefits.net/.
230 J. Etienne and S. Jackson
their own quality of life and for the benefits of the wider community. For example,
Adshead and Jamieson (2001) have shown that older women who learn together
retain important friendships that foster good relations whilst working with others in
the local community. The learning that takes place within informal and community
settings can play a pivotal role in helping to improve confidence and quality of life.
We argue that this type of learning also has capabilities beyond individual personal
achievement and towards a collective agenda of social responsibility. Widening and
adapting the type of informal learning practiced successfully by organisations such
as the NFWI can serve to foster good relations across communities, as we go on to
show below.
Lifelong learning takes place in many different ways and in an endless variety
of settings and may emerge through activities such as volunteering and community
participation (Schuller and Field 1998; Jackson 2002). Informal and community
lifelong learning dominates the learning that older people undertake, including
members of the WI (Jackson 2006). Women are a significant proportion of the older
population in the developed world and it is becoming clearer that policy makers
(see, e.g. National Institute for Adult and Continuing Education 1999; Better Gov-
ernment for Older People 2000; Department for Works and Pensions 2005) can
learn from hitherto hidden examples of approaches to informal learning in which
many women engage (see, e.g. Jackson 2002, 2006).
There has been increasing national and global political interest in the ideas of
learning societies and learning organisations which seek to reflect a commitment
to encouraging and celebrating learning (Field 2000), although understandings of
learning organisations do not always include groups such as the NFWI. However,
we argue here that this is a mistake as participating in informal learning, including
through the activities that membership of such organisations can offer, has been
linked to increased levels of practical community involvement through voluntary
activities, positively encouraging active ‘citizenship’ (Crick Report 2000). This in
turn can lead to greater involvement in aspects of social life such as political aware-
ness and a heightened sense of social responsibility. Given the increased interest in
lifelong and informal learning it is not surprising to find that it is explicitly linked
at policy level to other community/social initiatives in the UK such as neighbour-
hood renewal. All these different strands of policy are designed to involve specific
groups of people such as parents, volunteers and tenants with a range of educational
providers and community based agencies in an interconnected network of and for
lifelong learning.
Hammond (2002) and Schuller et€al. (2004) illustrate the extent to which people
who are engaged in learning are more likely to be active citizens. Civic responsibil-
ity and active citizenship has been described as one of the most powerful modes of
adult learning, providing opportunities for motivation, achievement and self-esteem
(Schuller 2001). Active citizenship can involve regularly participating in the life of
local communities through a range of activities, and the research demonstrated the
wide variety of ways in which the members of the WI engage. Many of the women
surveyed had an involvement in other organisations in the community around them,
usually as a result of their involvement with the WI. Sixty percent of Federation
18â•… Lifelong Learning in Later Years 231
Despite their political lives and campaigns, many of the WI members continue to
be constrained by the gendered constructions of wives and mothers that defined
them when they were younger. For older women in particular, it is likely that they
would have lived their younger lives embedded within traditionally gendered fam-
ily values (Thorne and Yalom 1982; Stacey 1996), with little opportunity to develop
identities outside of the roles of wife, mother or ever daughter-in-law. Apparent
family support could also be used to ensure that women stayed within the gendered
constructions of family roles:
My husband is the only child and his mother thought that you shouldn’t want anything else
other than your home, bringing up your children and your family and women that went out
working were the causes of all the problems with the young people. Margaret, Institute E
When I got the chance to get out…I was terrified of what my mother-in-law was going to
say—and I really do mean terrified. Liz, Institute V
Others found that possibilities were severely curtailed by prevailing policies and
ideologies of the time:
As a young woman I worked in the civil service and those days when you are married you
have to leave the civil service. It was the old fashioned idea that a married women didn’t
work anyway. If your husband couldn’t afford to keep you that was that. Mary, Institute I
5╇
The NFWI refers to ‘Chairman/men’ and the members we interviewed had little or no interest in
discussing the gendered implications of this.
6╇
Pseudonyms are used throughout.
232 J. Etienne and S. Jackson
Throughout the study there were numerous examples of women caring for family
members with no choice or opportunities to explore their own much yearned for
learning and social options:
Before joining the WI, I was at home bringing up my family, my two sons. I started back
to work when my youngest son was 11 years old, working for a GP part-time. I haven’t
worked then for 14 years which seemed a bit strange going back into the workplace at
that time. But I did that until 1994 when I was caring for my in-laws who were both in
and out of hospital for a period of time. So I had to give up my part-time work. Judith,
Institute O
The majority of women interviewed in the study (80% of case study respondents)
came from largely rural areas of the UK. Those living in rural areas revealed how
isolated they felt when relocating to new areas, particularly when following their
husbands for new employment opportunities. In such cases the women had little
say over where, when and how they lived. Many women interviewed had given
up their careers to support their husbands and raise their children. For the women,
membership of the WI was one way of coping with new surroundings and a way of
improving the quality of their lives, including training for work and acquiring new
skills. As one WI member explained:
I did a secretarial course when I left school, didn’t like it very much, married young, had
a couple of children. My husband was transferred to Germany; we spent 10 years living
abroad and decided that our children were becoming too German. He got a job here and my
neighbour encouraged me to join the WI. Chris, Institute B
Becoming involved informally with flower arranging led to her training as a florist
and then working doing wedding flowers.
Other women showed how important the WI has been to them in moving beyond
or through gendered constructions of family life and the constraints these can bring:
I was a secretary after school and then I got married quite young and we had 4 children. My
husband was at sea almost all of the time. And suddenly my husband got relocated so we
left. My life was totally different. But then I got to know someone who belongs to the WI
and now it’s been terribly busy since! Delia, Institute S
I had 34 years working in the same company after leaving school and I took early retirement to
become a full time carer. When my caring duties ceased I was totally out of local activities and
I was invited to attend a WI meeting and the rest, as they say, is history. Deborah, Institute M
Then I had 3 children and I was caring for my mother-in-law at the early years of my mar-
ried life so that kept me quite busy and then my mother-in-law died and very shortly after
that, my mother as well. The WI turned up just at the right moment. Annie, Institute D
We have notices generally around the area that there was going to be a WI opening in the
local church hall which is next to where I live. I have got an elderly mother who does live
with me and I can’t go too far and it’s absolutely beautiful to be right next door. So I said
‘Okay I will go and have a look’. Delia, Institute S
In some ways, the women-centred support of the WI has taken the place of family
support that would have previously existed. Vera noted that this was especially im-
portant for younger women, who may not have the family support that older women
had enjoyed:
18â•… Lifelong Learning in Later Years 233
They moved away from the family and they seem to get lost on the way. They haven’t got any
backup, they haven’t mother-in-law, mother near by when they need help. Vera, Institute R
The WI enables women to support and work with each other in ways which allows
them both to draw on gendered constructions and definitions and also to transcend
them, finding ways to re/construct expectations of and identities for older women
within the family.
One of the most frequently given reasons for joining the WI was ‘to meet new
friends’ and ‘for enjoyment and friendship’. When asked about the benefits of mem-
bership responses included ‘a sense of belonging and increased confidence’, and
women felt positively about being part of a large organisation that they described
as helping to improve their lives. One way in which this happened is finding that
others recognised that older women still have skills on which they can draw, includ-
ing traditional skills of homemaking. The WI offers informal learning through a
range of activities that are traditionally associated with homemaking, and which are
highly valued by some of the members. Such activities include, for example, cake
baking, jam making, needlecraft and flower-arranging. There was a high proportion
of learning taking place that is more traditionally associated with older women’s
groups, including cookery, craft, flower arranging, garden produce and preserve
making. Some respondents saw the development of these skills as adding value to
their retirement, and others as reviving a ‘dying art’ of benefit to the wider com-
munity. Both of these elements were important aspects of the wider benefits of
234 J. Etienne and S. Jackson
informal learning (and teaching skills to others). As Meridith (Institute R) said, ‘We
come from a generation that have been taught a little bit of these skills right from an
early age.’ It was important to her to be able to continue to develop such skills, as
well as pass them on to others.
Learning involves the construction of identities, the project of becoming (Burke
and Jackson 2007) and the impact of developing confidence is considerable for
some women. The women interviewed spoke positively about retirement and the
activities they were now enjoying and, once they joined the WI, they appeared to be
motivated to learn, although this was often not initially the prime reason for mem-
bership. Other informal learning in the WI takes place through activities such as the
regular local WI meetings, where members listen to invited speakers (35% of the
women interviewed said they were learning through those talks); and activities such
as organised walks, visits and exercise classes. As Joan said,
From a personal point of view…I haven’t got many opportunities to use my brain very
much and I felt this was somewhere I could do something. Use my general intelligence if
you like. Joan, Institute L
New opportunities can be developed through the learning that is offered through
their organisation, including the ways in which members engage with the range
of speakers that attend the local institute meetings. For example, in questionnaire
responses, members stated:
• I have a greater variety of subjects to discuss mainly arising from speakers.
• I believe it makes me a more interesting person and therefore able to interact
with other people.
• It makes me a more rounded person, broadening my horizons and encouraging
me to try new things.
More formally, learning also takes place where knowledge is gained through WI
roles such as that of Chairman, Treasurer or Secretary or WI Adviser. Members who
hold more formal roles within the WI receive a package of training, which
gives them the confidence to do the other things. We put on training classes here in January
for the presidents, the secretaries, the treasurers and the press and publicist officers so that
those people come here to be trained to do a better deliver within the WI and of course that
gives them the confidence to then if they are invited to join some other organisations or
gives them the confidence to apply to become a parish councillor or whatever. Liz, Institute L
Training for the role of WI Adviser, for example, includes sessions on public speak-
ing which helps enhance positive identities:
We also do public speaking courses. We have one of the national tutors as a member of our
federation. All WI Advisers have to have public speaking, two sessions of that. That is very
popular. That is something that the members do enjoy. And it does give you confidence and
it’s all learning. Joan, Institute Y
For one member at least, joining the WI provided a chance to study for a higher
education programme for the first time. Here the respondent shows the importance
of this for her identity, including the way she is seen by others, in words that echo
those of Vera, above:
Membership of the WI gave me the confidence to study for a degree— after gaining a BA
in Psychology—at home I’m suddenly somebody! Annie, Institute D
However, most members stay within the WI to develop their learning and skills, and
the variety of roles within the WI also provide additional opportunities for learning:
Well starting in my own WI level, I have been Secretary and President. I have served on all
the committees. I have been chairman of home economics and the arts and then I have been
vice-chairman of the federation and subsequently the chairman of the federation. And I am
a WI adviser. Maureen, Institute T
WI members also learn in other ways through their involvement with the WI, such
as conducting the research necessary to develop resolutions for Annual General
Meetings. As Shirley explained:
I have been to attend the meeting which is held where the speakers come along to give us
information. And then I have to prepare the resolution to present to all the members. Bear in
mind that we have 100s of members. It is pretty daunting because I hadn’t ever done public
speaking before and I have now presented 3 resolutions. Shirley, Institute G
Wider learning occurs when the women are able to pass on the knowledge ac-
cumulated to others, and to recognise and have recognised the links between
learning and active citizenship. The connections between learning and active citi-
zenship have been well documented (see section above) and, as Mehdizadeh and
Scott’s chapter in Part II of this volume shows, there are strong links between
education and economic participation as essential elements of women’s citizen-
ship. However, less has been written about ways in which learning for active citi-
zenship enhance identities for otherwise marginalised individuals, such as older
women:
I think it’s very important because if we are to remain the biggest women’s organisation
which we are at the moment and represent the women’s point of view we must not let it
shrink to the point that people say ‘Oh the WI is a handful of people’. It must be a good
proportion of the population representing the female point of view which is one of the rea-
sons we started out—women—from just housewives to something more important for the
country. Maureen, Institute T
Not just to be, but to be seen to be, an active member of society was important to
the majority of members. The women were asked how they benefited from informal
learning in the WI and the three most popular responses were ‘enjoyment’; ‘better
health and keeping active’ and ‘being seen as a valuable member of society’. Al-
though ageing can bring a reduction in the number of activities with which a person
engages (Atchley 1993), the continuation and development of some activities has
important benefits, including a sense of shared social responsibility. As we go on to
show below, for some respondents re/developing identities through a shared sense
of community best happens in women-only spaces.
236 J. Etienne and S. Jackson
Women-Only Spaces
As part of the research the women were asked ‘What are the most important benefits
of membership of the WI?’ Nearly 50% said ‘working with other women’. Support
for each other was highly valued:
Being there for each other I think WI is giving me confidence and once you become sec-
retary and president I think you gain confidence. I think as I was secretary for some time
they ring me for things, for chatting and they feel that somebody is there that would listen. I
think that is important that women are there for each other for all sorts of things, education,
or just listening, a cup of tea and a shoulder. Margaret, Institute E
In particular, a safe and ‘secure’ woman-only environment was valued (for further
discussion, see Jackson 2004, 2006). As one member said:
They can go to Denman, they don’t have to take a course, they could just do walking and
singing and that would give them an opportunity to have a little holiday, branching out
by themselves, knowing that they were going to be in a secure environment with other
women.
The women-only space of their local Institutes gave the women the confidence to
move into public spaces. They were more able to engage in community activities if
they knew that other members of the WI would also be present, creating a women-
only space within wider social spaces. Women felt they had something in common
with each other, especially as members of the WI:
I could go on that because I would go with my friends or at least I would know there will
be all WI ladies there and therefore I would have something in common and I wouldn’t be
isolated. Shirley, Institute G
18â•… Lifelong Learning in Later Years 237
The lack of isolation was particularly important at moments of transition. The wom-
en described a range of support from fellow WI members particularly when going
through separation, loss and bereavement and described how membership of the WI
helped them cope at a time when they were frightened and alone, and to move on to
develop new ways of being. For example, one woman talked of support following
divorce.
I went through a rather nasty divorce and if it hadn’t been for the WI and the fact that I
had friends and the support network that I needed…. Really it taught me that if you make
friends what you put into it sometimes is what you get out again. Ruth, Institute R
Women-only spaces were particularly important for many of the women at times of
bereavement.
The friendship you make as a member of the WI is just amazing. The support members
give to each other when they are going through bereavement is very special indeed. Many
women who are not so active in the WI…when their husbands die they return to the WI and
become alive again! Myrtle, Institute E
After the death of my husband I don’t know where I would be if it hadn’t been for the sup-
port from the WI. Sylvia, Institute C
I am a recent widow too. The friendship and the support from the WI have been immense
and without that I would have been in a much worse condition. And also the confidence that
I could do things on my own, it wasn’t with the family all the time, I was doing something
for me, for myself. Irene, Institute H
For many women, the opportunity to develop, learn and socialise in women-only
spaces was a central way in which their identities become (re-)affirmed. Neverthe-
less, the women surveyed were aware that the future existence of the women-only
spaces of the WI may well be under threat because of changes in the world around
them:
A lot of people now are forced to become introverted, they are afraid to go out, they don’t
join things…I don’t really know what is causing it but the newspapers are frightening peo-
ple, they don’t go out at night. June, Institute F
This is particularly true of women living in rural areas, as is the case with the ma-
jority of women interviewed. There is a rural/urban divide in access to learning
and social activities (Tuckett and McCauley 2005). In rural areas, where most of
the women in this research are located, a severe lack of public transport prevents
older women from attending education centres, and the older women are the more
likely they are to be dependent on public transport (Jackson 2005). There is also a
perceived risk about being out in the dark, which in winter in England can mean
from around 3.00 in the afternoon. Remoteness was threatening the future existence
of some WIs.
238 J. Etienne and S. Jackson
Many years ago when I was secretary I did write to the county because we were starting to
organise our county style base because we just couldn’t get our memberships into […]. It’s
too far. There it was difficult to park anyway. That was rather a shame for us. We have been
rather isolated. Patricia, Institute H
Venturing out at night was a real concern for older women learners, who tried to
find other ways to access learning and social networking opportunities:
But it is in the evenings and we are an afternoon club and that makes a difference because
there are a lot of elderly and they are not working and they want an afternoon meeting,
people don’t want to go out in the evening. Delia, Institute S
Of real concern to many members was the cut in funding for adult education that has
been seen in the UK as well as in Europe, North America and Australia.
We used to get a grant from […] County Council and our classes were grant aided so you
could help, you would pay for the tutor. But of course they don’t give us anything now so
we now have decided that we will have workshops here to try to take the place of these of
the granted classes. That is our big aim at the moment…. Val, Institute P
A lack of funding for non-accredited courses means that older women are denied
opportunities that were also denied to them when younger (Jackson 2004). As
one respondent explained, ‘Some of us missed out on education when we were
young, there weren’t the opportunities’, and there were real concerns by officers
and members of the NFWI that the opportunities may be continuing to be denied.
The less likely people are to have continued education whilst young, the less likely
they are to participate when they are older (Sargeant et€al. 1997; Schuller 2002),
leaving older women doubly disadvantaged. The research has shown that women-
only spaces are particularly important in helping overcome such disadvantage, and
such spaces need to be developed through community and voluntary groups and
organisations.
An officer at Denman College stated that far from women having less need for
learning as they grow older:
I think (lifelong learning) is actually more important…. The speed of changes in commu-
nity, society, technology, these are all having an impact on individuals and families and I
think it’s crucial that people keep up to date because if they don’t they would be out of step
with society. Also I think…to keep people engaged in society, to keep people engaged with
other people, learning brings people together…I think that it’s absolutely crucial. What
worries me now is that funding has been cut for a lot of these lifelong learning opportunities
locally…. So I think in the future it is going to be very much down to community groups
and voluntary organisations…
18â•… Lifelong Learning in Later Years 239
Yet the women-only spaces provided through such groups and community organi-
sations are dwindling, especially spaces for older women. Like other providers of
adult and continuing education, the NFWI have had problems with public funding,
especially with regard to non-accredited courses, which the government will no
longer fund. The NFWI has an active campaign to lobby Government on widening
participation within a lifelong learning agenda, as these issues have potentially seri-
ous implications for older learners.
Conclusions
Even in retirement, choices that exist for the WI members are largely influenced by
family responsibilities, money, networks of support as well as the expectations of
the wider community. Listening to the voices of older women participating in the
study has demonstrated the hurdles and obstacles to learning faced by a particular
group of women at a critical stage in the life course. On the one hand the research
shows the women in this project to be largely privileged, white, heterosexual, edu-
cated, middle class, confident and strong willed, living mainly in rural areas and in
control of their learning lives. On the other, it shows that they are still constructed
through dominant discourses about older women, embedded in the social construc-
tion of gendered roles within the family. Most significantly, the study has consid-
ered the reality of ‘choice’ for a seemingly privileged group of women and has
demonstrated the many facets to learning and participation in later years.
Through informal learning, members of the WI are able to improve the quality of
their lives and those of the community around them. Responses show that the key
benefits of membership of the WI include the ability to develop positive identities
which leave older women feeling that they can play an active and useful role outside
of family responsibilities, and engage with their wider communities.
We argue that in an ageing society organisations like the WI can be an effective
tool in promoting integration and community cohesion at a time when the numbers
of elders from a range of cross-cultural backgrounds are increasing in significant
numbers. Community cohesion policies suggest that all groups in society should
strive for shared values, behaviour patterns and knowledge to allow all groups to
feel that they are in some sense part of the whole. Adult education, whether deliv-
ered in further education colleges, universities, or in adult or community centres,
has been one of the greatest building blocks of community cohesion. However cuts
in funding has meant that older learners are increasingly not included as part of a
strategy to help promote community relations and we have argued here that this has
a particularly severe effect on women.
With cuts in funding and with the gendered constructions and identities for older
learners, we have argued that very little choice exists for older women to participate
in lifelong learning in order to broaden their horizons and benefit the wider commu-
nity. The NFWI is one means whereby older women can continue to make societal
contributions and continue to engage in their own lifelong learning. Finally, we
240 J. Etienne and S. Jackson
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Chapter 19
Part III: Conclusion
S. Jackson ()
Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning, Birkbeck University of London,
26 Russell Square, WC1B 5DQ London, UK
e-mail: s.jackson@bbk.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 243
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_19, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
244 S. Jackson et al.
gendered constructions and identities for learners in formal, workplace and infor-
mal sites, often very little choice exists for women to participate in lifelong learn-
ing in ways which helps construct and reconstruct positive identities. Nevertheless,
some spaces can be opened out which enable women’s everyday learning practices
to be uncovered and de/re/constructed.
Chapter 20
Policy Challenges: New Spaces for Women’s
Lifelong Learning
Introduction
I. Malcolm ()
School of Education, University of Dundee, Dundee, UK
e-mail: i.z.malcolm@dundee.ac.uk
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 245
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_20, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
246 I. Malcolm et al.
when women in lifelong learning challenge their own positioning and the ways that
theory and praxis are developed, in order to find new ways of knowing.
The book is interested in ways in which broadening of choice can widen participa-
tion in several arena, including in learning, in the workplace and in communities.
Although, in the main, the chapters in this book are concerned with women’s gen-
dered choices, the authors also discuss choices which are located in constructions
of masculinities, aspirations and decision-making processes. While widening par-
ticipation is a central concern in lifelong learning policies and practices, choices
are fashioned through the complexities of identities and identifications, through
current discourses of transformation and social justice within widening participa-
tion debates. It has been argued that debates about widening participation make
simplistic assumptions about targeting particular students, and about the benefits
of participation (Thomas 2001). We raise a concern that debates do not explicitly
address gender as an issue, and there is little recognition in discussions of widen-
ing participation in work-based learning, for example, of the difficulties faced in a
gendered (and classed) workplace for women with children. Women make up the
majority of part-time workers and the lack of choices that there are for women in
balancing work and childcare cause particular disadvantages. Women’s representa-
tion in employment has continued to increase in a number of western countries.
However, women are still underrepresented internationally, particularly in posi-
tions of power and in specific sectors, such as technology (Faulkner 2004). This
means that women’s contributions are at the periphery of new areas of work in the
knowledge economy and the digital economy. Their contributions are hidden and
contested, as is women’s complicity in some of the adverse effects of new economy
developments.
The book highlights the gendering of skills and women’s exclusion, critiquing
the link between gendered choices and the skills agenda. Despite current discourses,
we argue that learning for community development does not detract from the case
for a skilled economy. However, this case is often presented in a way that neglects
the complexities of the skills agenda and policies that promote it. For example,
the nature of skills is contested, there are tensions around what types of skills are
needed and whether new approaches to work represent de-skilling or up-skilling:
there is some evidence that both happen to different groups in the same workplace
(Munro and Rainbird 2002), having differential effects on women. Furthermore,
due to the dynamic nature of work and the impact of changing technology, new
skills quickly become outmoded. At the same time, instrumental and skills-based
learning are also seen to have some beneficial effects on women’s confidence and
work efficacy (Hyde, this volume). However, the book highlights the paradoxical
248 I. Malcolm et al.
aspect of the skills agenda as authors critique the gendered nature of skills which
essentialise women as being more suited to certain types of work, such as caring.
The resulting tension casts doubt on the wider benefits of confining lifelong learn-
ing to developing skills, pointing to the relevance of a broader, more durable educa-
tion for women’s inclusion and career progress. Another problem suggested in the
present volume is the way that a focus on a skills-based economy excludes not only
women with caring responsibilities, but also other groups including older women.
These women are not in the labour market and are constructed through dominant
discourses, embedded in the social construction of gendered roles within the fam-
ily. Nevertheless, women’s community participation and active citizenship can be
widened through informal learning and women’s networks, benefiting the commu-
nity and broadening the choices available to women in older age. For this reason,
we argue that those working in the field of lifelong learning should continue to
critique the gendered nature of learning dominated by skills development. Gender
and citizenship is a critical issue for women, and one way to increase choices for
women is to widen opportunities for community participation. This emphasises the
importance of learning that is life-wide and, while it encompasses the benefits of
having skills, it moves beyond these to embrace political and community dimen-
sions. These dimensions are threatened by the depoliticisation of learning and work
that is strongly focussed on skills to the exclusion of other aspects.
The book demonstrates how spaces that women occupy are made up of a range of
relations at different sites, from the public spheres of work, to the household (which
may also be a place of work).The idea that women occupy spaces in a way that is re-
lated to gender roles has been developed in discussions of women’s work (Fenwick
2006, 2008). Relating women’s learning, work and identities to space allows us to
highlight the way that diverse influences articulate in gendered choices. This view
can disrupt some received notions of the relations between private and public, local
and global and women’s identification with private and local spaces.
One way to develop resistances to constructions of gender, to find new ways
of knowing, is through women-centred spaces. It can be extremely beneficial for
women to have a community of other women around them in order to contest gen-
dered, classed and racialised spaces (Bloom 2009). Lifelong learning itself is a con-
tested space, and a critique of the concept points to it as an ideological distraction
that shifts the burden of increasing adaptability onto the worker. Some of the au-
thors clearly demonstrate the enforced gender segregation that takes place in learn-
ing spaces and in the workplace. Indeed, it emerges that women-only spaces offer
vital support for women and for the development of women’s solidarity.
The book explores such issues in depth, demonstrating that although women
only spaces are sites of power as well as resistances, significant and complex learn-
ing can and does take place. Learning through participation in women-centred spac-
20â•… Policy Challenges 249
Imagined Domains
The writing in the above chapters demonstrates that disrupting gendered choices
has far-reaching implications for learning, work and identity. While women-only
spaces and the support of these are important, a problem which seems particularly
relevant for the future is how women are to increase their representation in other
spaces, and what stance they should adopt there.
In order to realise some of the new possibilities discussed in the chapters above,
women have to be able to imagine new spaces of representation and new identity
possibilities. They need to envision new forms of learning and new roles that chal-
lenge the way diverse influences inform gendered choices. The interrelation of the
250 I. Malcolm et al.
book’s themes points to imagined domains that connect them; however, the impact
of imagined domains on women’s gendered learning and its link to the forms of
capital that women sustain have received little attention in education discourses.
In other areas of social science, the connection between social capital theory and
imagination is not new (Almond and Verba 1963; cited in Hooghe and Stolle 2003,
p.€69). However, with the exception of Quinn’s work on imagined social capital, it
has not been taken up in education discourses (Quinn 2005).
Drawing on the imagined domain to analyse lifelong learning presents a number
of theoretical and practical challenges. We expect learning to have tangible benefits
that can be studied to enhance future practice. The ways in which the realm of
the imagination contributes to women’s learning, work and identity are inherently
difficult to quantify, although some research points to its significance for the em-
powerment of women learners (Quinn 2003). It may be risky to raise the question
of imagined domains in science, given that they appear antithetical to the foun-
dation of rational thought. In the middle of the 20th century (and more recently)
imagined domains have been exploited by political regimes that pursued oppressive
policies and committed war crimes. In the 21st century they are recruited in market-
ing commodities, selling TV talent shows and in disseminating an extreme view of
how women should look. Perhaps as a result of the contested nature of imagined
domains, there has been little discussion of the struggles in imagination, or of the
potentially contested nature of imagined capital that is influenced, for example,
by neo-liberalism. The lack of debate on the role of imagined domains presents a
further challenge for feminist writing in lifelong learning that seeks to develop new
visions of women’s participation. Arguably, new roles and new identities have to be
imagined before they can be realised.
Conclusion
The book presents a case in favour of lifelong learning that eschews gendered
choices and is able to respond to the challenge of social cohesion under the pres-
sure of global competition. By linking learning, work and identity at a range of sites
including the home, women’s networks and the shop floor, the book addresses some
of the normative assumptions about women’s positions. It encourages critique of
representations of widening participation and the skills agenda that deny their com-
plex implications. Among the challenges related to this is the continuing depoliti-
cisation of women’s learning drawn from a narrowed concept of lifelong learning
that focuses predominantly on skills. We argue in favour of feminist scholarship in
lifelong learning that develops further the politicisation of women’s work (Devos
2002) and relates it to women’s learning.
The need to reconceptualise global and local, core and periphery, highlights the
roles that women play in global economics, sometimes marginalised by techno-
muscular capitalism, and in other ways complicit. The lack of feminist attention to
neglected sites of women’s learning and work that contribute to globalisation can be
20â•… Policy Challenges 251
linked to concerns raised about the western and Anglophone domination of the field
of gender and education (Öhrn and Weiner 2009): to address both of these problems
an international perspective is needed. This requires engagement with the broad
impact of gendered choices, considering these from a position that highlights the
inter-relatedness of women’s experiences in different countries (Gillard et€al. 2007).
New feminist directions in lifelong learning must begin by looking at women’s
roles in spaces that are not yet imagined and begin to envision women’s presence
at new sites of learning and work, opening up new identity possibilities. Women’s
progress in schooling and in higher education is due to the expectations of women
themselves: increased gender consciousness in being able to imagine equal participa-
tion shows that women’s expectations have been a force for social change. In this way,
choice could be reclaimed from its neo-liberal configuration. This may open up further
possibilities to challenge the political agendas that underpin lifelong learning policies.
Theoretical developments might support such a reconfiguration of choice through
further work on the role of imagined domains and how women can contribute to and
influence new knowledges (Jensen 2007) that are developed across the areas of
articulation discussed above. In this way, new “imaginative geographies” (Massey
1994, p.€2) of lifelong learning may be created. The book makes a case in favour of
continued involvement by feminist educationalists with policy to support learning
that is life wide, and not job narrow. This means advocating learning programmes
that are based on ideas of social justice and on continued engagement with some of
the complexities of gendered choices that are highlighted in this book.
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Index
A C
active citizenship, 2, 228, 230, 235, 248 careers, 16, 45, 47, 54–56, 59, 60, 63, 65, 66,
active citizens, 2, 210, 228, 230, 235, 248 77–79, 85, 90, 99, 100, 102, 108, 124,
age, 1–4, 6–9, 14, 15, 19–25, 27–29, 31, 32, 163, 191, 193, 198–200, 202, 203, 222,
37–43, 45, 46, 53–59, 61, 62, 64–66, 232, 245
71–74, 76, 79, 80, 87, 89–92, 95–106, career break, 15, 23, 53–55, 57, 61–66
108–110, 113–127, 129–134, 136–143, career choice, 16, 90, 101, 102, 168, 169,
146–148, 150–152, 154–158, 160, 163, 243
167–170, 173–185, 190–195, 197–201, Caring, 23, 46, 92, 125, 136, 169, 190, 202,
203–205, 209, 211–219, 221–223, 203, 210, 211, 219, 220, 222, 223, 232,
227–230, 232–239, 243, 245–248, 250, 245, 248, 249
251 Catalunya, 16, 71
agency, 32, 92, 115, 116, 119, 123, 136, 146, child care, 62, 140, 211
174, 182, 183, 185, 191, 212, 221, 222 choice (s) 1, 4–8, 13–16, 19, 37, 46, 53, 54,
individual, 1, 2, 4, 8, 13–16, 28, 31, 32, 69, 71, 73, 75, 77–79, 81, 83, 85, 89,
37–41, 43, 44, 46–49, 59, 61, 65, 66, 90, 92, 95, 99, 102, 108, 113, 129,
79, 80, 91, 95, 99–101, 103, 104, 106, 140,145, 150, 163, 167–170, 173,
108, 109, 114–116, 121, 124, 125, 130, 189–191, 201, 209, 210, 222, 227, 228,
132, 135, 137, 142, 169, 175–177, 239, 243, 245–251
179, 184, 185, 189–194, 197, 211, 214, class, 1, 2, 6–8, 13, 19, 20, 27–29, 32, 37–39,
228–230, 235, 238, 243, 246 41–44, 46, 48, 49, 58, 74, 78, 89–91,
personal, 1, 8, 15, 19, 25, 28–30, 32, 44, 105, 114, 115, 118, 119, 121, 126, 127,
47, 57, 60, 61, 63–65, 77, 79, 100, 107, 138, 139, 147, 163, 167–170, 175,
114–116, 119, 121, 125, 126, 132, 134, 177–179, 181, 189–191, 193–195, 197,
135, 137, 138, 140, 141, 147, 169, 176, 202–204, 209, 214, 221, 228, 234, 236,
177, 180, 183, 189–192, 195, 197, 200, 238, 239, 243, 245–248
201, 203–205, 210, 213, 220, 230, 234, social class , 2, 8, 118, 167, 168, 170,
243 190, 194, 195, 202, 205, 214, 221,
agentic, 212 228, 243
Aimhigher, 43, 49 collaboration, 61, 66, 71, 215
ambivalence, 26, 169, 194, 197, 202–204 collaborative experience
aspirations, 14, 15, 37–41, 43–49, 63, 170, Community, 2, 3, 7, 20, 23, 45, 46, 48, 49, 61,
198, 203, 227, 236, 247 66, 70, 75, 113, 116, 117, 126,
132, 148, 169, 177, 179, 183–185,
B 200, 210, 213–215, 219, 221, 222,
benefits for employers, 124 227–231, 233–236, 238, 239, 245,
Birkbeck Institute for Lifelong Learning, 1, 7, 247, 248
167, 243 cohesion, 2, 229, 239, 250
S. Jackson et al. (eds.), Gendered Choices, Lifelong Learning Book Series 15, 253
DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7, ©Â€Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011
254 Index
D G
decision-making, 14, 15, 37, 44, 46, 74, 90, gender, 1–8, 11, 13–16, 19, 20, 24, 25, 27,
137, 147, 169, 189, 190, 192–194, 197, 28, 30, 31, 37–39, 41–44, 46, 53–61,
199, 202–205, 217, 247 64–66, 69–71, 73, 75, 78, 80, 81, 85,
discourse, 1–7, 14, 15, 24, 26, 31, 38–49, 75, 87, 89–92, 95–99, 101, 104, 109–111,
90, 133, 138, 141, 148, 169, 189–191, 113–115, 117–119, 121, 123, 125–127,
194, 197, 199, 200, 204, 210, 215–220, 129, 130, 135–142, 145–148, 151, 152,
222, 228, 239, 246–250 154, 157, 159, 160, 163, 167–170, 173,
discursive repertoires, 15 176, 189–195, 197, 199, 201–205, 209,
218, 223, 227, 229, 231–233, 236, 239,
E 243, 245–251
educated women, 108, 145, 147, 149–159, gender harassment, 70
161 impact, 5, 7, 15, 16, 19, 20, 24, 26, 29, 32,
education, 1–5, 8, 13, 14, 19–24, 27–34, 37, 40, 49, 53, 57, 60, 62, 63, 65, 69,
37–49, 51, 53–61, 63, 65–67, 69, 72, 71, 72, 74, 77–81, 89, 91, 96, 99, 101,
75–80, 85, 89–92, 96, 97, 99, 102, 109, 116, 123, 124, 126, 129, 138, 146,
103, 106, 108, 109, 113–120, 122, 126, 147, 151, 156, 167, 168, 170, 173, 180,
127, 129–142, 145–154, 156–159, 168, 185, 229, 234, 238, 247, 250, 251
169, 173–175, 178, 179, 184, 189–195, pay gap, 97, 130, 190
197–200, 202–205, 209–216, 221–223, practice of, 6, 31, 124, 141, 142, 182, 216
227–231, 235–239, 243, 245, 248, 250, relationships, 16, 25, 30, 70, 72, 73, 76,
251 78, 80, 81, 85, 117, 123, 126, 174–178,
Access to Higher, 23, 39, 136, 141, 151, 180, 182, 185, 189, 192–194, 202, 204,
214 210, 213, 220
adult, 2–4, 8, 19–24, 26, 53, 56, 65, 72, 90, segregation, 4, 91, 96, 97, 99, 100, 104,
91, 96, 102, 103, 105, 108, 114–117, 110, 111, 192, 248
119, 122, 125–127, 131, 133, 174, 177, violence, 6, 16, 69–76, 79–81, 85, 215, 222
179, 190–194, 197, 201, 203, 209, 211, gendered, 1–8, 11, 13–15, 19, 30, 31, 37–39,
212, 230, 231, 238, 239, 246 42–44, 46, 53, 55, 57, 61, 69, 85, 86,
distance, 14, 22, 28, 56–58, 65, 126, 176, 89–92, 95, 113, 129, 135–139, 142,
177, 184, 200 145–147, 151, 163, 167–170, 173,
early years, 168, 169, 173–179, 182–184, 189–194, 197, 201, 203, 204, 209, 218,
186, 232 227, 229, 231–233, 236, 239, 243,
initial post-compulsory, 197–199 245–251
educational choice, 46, 54, 191 choices, 1, 4–8, 13–16, 19, 37, 46, 53, 54,
equal opportunities, 13, 96, 99, 106, 138, 141, 69, 71, 73, 75, 77–79, 81, 83, 85, 89,
147 90, 92, 95, 99, 102, 108, 113, 129, 140,
Index 255
145, 150, 163, 167–170, 173, 189–191, 179, 181, 182, 184, 190, 193, 201–204,
201, 209, 210, 222, 227, 228, 239, 243, 213, 231, 233–237, 239, 243, 244,
245–251 246–250
employment, 2, 5, 7, 20, 23, 53–55, 57–66, ideologies, 1, 4, 231
89–92, 95–97, 99, 104–106, 109, 110, inequality, 30, 38, 40, 41, 49, 54, 91, 92, 147,
114, 116, 125, 130, 131, 135–141, 148, 152
145–147, 150–159, 163, 167, 169, 174, instrumental, 38, 91, 119–123, 126, 127, 199,
193–195, 197–200, 202–204, 211, 213, 201, 247
214, 220–222, 229, 232, 245, 247 motivations, 91, 114, 118–121, 123,
identity, 3, 6, 7, 37, 38, 43, 44, 49, 85, 98, 125–127
109, 110, 115, 119, 134, 149, 163, 165, outcomes, 14, 15, 21, 23, 24, 26, 32, 60,
168–170, 173, 175, 177, 179, 181–187, 62, 63, 65, 91, 114, 123, 125–127, 132,
189, 200, 202, 205, 212, 219, 220, 228, 178, 180, 182, 185, 201
233, 235, 236, 245, 246, 249–251 skills, 2–7, 14, 19–23, 29, 31, 32, 41,
learning, 1–8, 11, 13–16, 19–27, 29–33, 42, 49, 53, 57, 58, 60, 62–66, 89–91,
35, 37, 38, 40–42, 49, 53, 57, 58, 60, 95–97, 99, 102–105, 108, 110,
61, 63, 65, 69, 71, 77, 81, 85–87, 114–124, 126, 127, 130–133, 135,
89–92, 95, 96, 99, 102, 103, 105, 108, 137, 141–143, 150, 152–156, 163,
113–127, 129, 131–139, 141–145, 147, 174, 176, 178, 180–182, 184,
154, 159, 163, 167–170, 173–185, 189, 190, 200, 212–215, 217, 221,
193, 199, 200, 204, 209–223, 227–241, 222, 227, 231–235, 243, 246–248,
243–251 250
pathways, 3–7, 11, 13, 14, 86, 89, 163, interdisciplinary, 15, 59
165, 167, 190, 209–211, 213, 215, 217, International Women’s Day, 215
219, 221, 223, 225, 245, 246 interpersonal ties, 169, 189, 191, 201, 205,
standpoints, 197, 201–204 243
globalisation, 5, 40, 89, 243, 249, 250 Iran, 4, 8, 89, 90, 92, 145–161, 163
grassroots organising, 209
K
H knowledge, 2, 5–8, 19, 24–27, 30, 31, 37, 44,
higher education, 15, 19–24, 27, 29, 32, 55, 57, 58, 60, 63, 65, 67, 71, 73, 76,
37–44, 53, 54, 75, 90, 91, 102, 108, 81, 89–92, 97, 102, 110, 121, 122, 124,
113, 129–139, 142, 147–149, 151, 153, 126, 131–133, 142, 153, 156, 167, 169,
154, 158, 169, 174, 175, 178, 184, 189, 173, 176–185, 190, 191, 210, 211, 213,
209, 210, 213, 214, 221, 222, 229, 235, 214, 220–223, 229, 234, 235, 239, 243,
251 246, 247, 251
higher education credit framework, 133 knowledge-based economy, 2, 92, 97, 153
I L
identity, 3, 6, 7, 37, 38, 43, 44, 49, 85, 98, learner, 2, 4, 6, 8, 14, 15, 19, 20, 23, 32, 37,
109, 110, 115, 119, 134, 149, 163, 165, 38, 42, 90, 91, 95, 97, 99, 101, 103,
168–170, 173, 175, 177, 179, 181–187, 105–107, 109, 111, 113–116, 118–127,
189, 200, 202, 205, 212, 219, 220, 228, 129–134, 136, 137, 141, 142, 163, 175,
233, 235, 236, 245, 246, 249–251 177, 190, 209, 213, 222, 227, 229,
excluded, 41, 44, 123, 143, 209, 221 238–240, 243, 244, 249, 250
intersections of, 38, 42, 169 centred, 6, 122, 137, 168, 213, 220, 232,
student, 16, 19, 20, 22–24, 26–32, 37–39, 236, 237, 243, 248, 249
41–43, 45–48, 54, 57–62, 65, 69, motivations for engagement, 114, 119,
71–81, 90, 102, 108, 114, 119, 120, 123, 127
122, 124, 127, 129–132, 134–136, narratives, 20, 25, 48, 114, 214
148–150, 173–185, 199, 201, 247 stories, 16, 19, 26, 27, 29–32, 39, 44, 61,
identities, 1, 3, 6, 7, 13–15, 37, 38, 41, 44, 65, 67, 71, 91, 113–115, 119, 120, 123,
78, 126, 138, 163, 167–170, 173, 174, 124, 126, 127, 177
256 Index
learners, 2, 4, 6, 8, 14, 15, 19, 20, 23, 37, 95, 97, 100–103, 105, 108, 113–121,
38, 42, 90, 91, 95, 97, 99, 101, 103, 123–127, 129–135, 137, 141, 145, 163,
105–107, 109, 111, 113–116, 118–127, 167, 169, 173, 174, 177, 189, 192, 195,
129–131, 133, 134, 136, 137, 141, 142, 197, 199–201, 203, 204, 209, 211–213,
163, 175, 177, 190, 209, 213, 222, 227, 220, 221, 227–233, 235, 237–241,
229, 238–240, 244, 249, 250 243–251
experienced, 19, 21, 28, 30, 58, 72, 74, history, 7, 39, 60, 91, 114, 115, 200, 232
76–79, 81, 92, 114, 129, 133, 138, 141, stage, 7, 54, 71, 80, 89, 90, 101, 102, 178,
143, 145, 176, 184, 194, 204, 214, 215, 179, 192, 195, 197, 203, 204, 228, 239
217, 221 stories, 16, 19, 26, 27, 29–32, 39, 44, 61,
novice, 56, 129, 131 67, 71, 91, 113–115, 119, 120, 123,
older women, 90, 91, 97, 98, 100, 105, 124, 126, 127, 177
109, 114, 125, 127, 129, 170, 227–233, lifelong learning, 1–8, 13–15, 19, 22, 23, 31,
235, 237–240, 248, 249 37, 38, 40–42, 49, 53, 57, 69, 71, 81,
situated and embodied, 14 85, 89, 91, 95, 103, 105, 108, 113, 114,
learning, 1–8, 11, 13–16, 19–27, 29–33, 35, 116–118, 125–127, 129, 131, 135, 145,
37, 38, 40–42, 49, 53, 57, 58, 60, 163, 167, 169, 173, 174, 189, 199, 209,
61, 63, 65, 69, 71, 77, 81, 85–87, 212, 220, 221, 227–231, 233, 235,
89–92, 95, 96, 99, 102, 103, 105, 108, 237–239, 241, 243–251
113–127, 129, 131–139, 141–145, 147, learning policies, 1, 3, 5, 14, 15, 114, 135,
154, 159, 163, 167–170, 173–185, 189, 143, 228, 247, 251
193, 199, 200, 204, 209–223, 227–241, Literacy, 44, 209, 213, 214, 216, 220–222
243–251 illiteracy, 214, 221
at work, 1, 90, 116, 120, 124, 125, 131, low pay, 57, 118, 136, 139, 140, 143
137, 138, 146, 173, 177, 202, 219 paid, 5, 6, 20, 58, 60, 63, 91, 97, 98, 109,
barriers to, 54, 62–64, 76, 77, 89, 92, 98, 113, 114, 118, 119, 122, 123, 125, 126,
102, 105, 109, 127, 153, 156, 212, 229 135, 146, 152, 157, 158, 163, 168, 176,
choices, 1, 4–8, 13–16, 19, 37, 46, 53, 54, 213, 214, 233, 249
69, 71, 73, 75, 77–79, 81, 83, 85, 89,
90, 92, 95, 99, 102, 108, 113, 129, 140, M
145, 150, 163, 167–170, 173, 189–191, male-dominated domain, 69, 72, 73, 81
201, 209, 210, 222, 227, 228, 239, 243, marginalisation, 74, 85
245–251 marketising education,, 21
culture of, 30, 63, 124 marketisation, 4, 5, 14, 19, 21
experience-based, 132–137 Marxist, 212
formal, 2–4, 42, 61, 65, 66, 81, 92, 96, masculinity, 37–39, 41, 46, 47, 70, 80, 81
97, 113–116, 119, 120, 123–127, 129, mature students, 23, 41, 42, 90, 102, 131
131–139, 142, 165, 167–170, 173, 179, men’s learning, 4, 7, 13, 16, 85, 170, 210–212,
190, 193, 198, 200, 209–215, 217–219, 220, 221, 246, 248–250
221–223, 225, 227, 229, 230, 232–235, micropractices, 211
239, 244, 248, 249 Middle East, 145, 156
informal, 2–4, 65, 66, 81, 125, 129, misogyny, 69, 72, 76, 77
131–133, 138, 142, 167–170, 209–215, mothers, 30, 46, 92, 145, 148, 156–159, 163,
217–219, 221–223, 225, 227, 229, 230, 169, 176, 201, 203, 204, 231
232–235, 239, 244, 248, 249 motivations, 91, 114, 118–121, 123, 125–127
journey, 91, 113–116, 125–127, 176, 177,
185 N
return to learn, 102, 114, 123 National Federation of Women’s Institutes,
Leitch Report, 7, 20, 89 170, 227
liberal, 1–5, 13–15, 21, 40, 41, 44, 45, 47–49, neoliberal, 21, 40, 41, 44, 45, 47–49
91, 117, 126, 190, 204, 212, 245, neoliberalism, 40, 41, 44, 45, 48, 49
249–251 networks, 3, 6, 61, 62, 65–67, 81, 85, 124,
life, 1–8, 13–16, 19, 21–25, 27, 29–31, 37, 129, 167–169, 189, 190, 192–194, 198,
38, 40–42, 45, 48, 49, 53, 57, 59–61, 202, 204, 205, 239, 243, 248, 250
64, 69, 71, 73, 75–78, 81, 85, 89–91, circles, 55, 65, 214, 217, 220
Index 257
discourses, 1–6, 14, 15, 24, 26, 31, 38, 41, funding, 3, 4, 13, 15, 20, 21, 23, 41, 56, 58,
42, 44–49, 90, 169, 190, 191, 194, 197, 61, 62, 66, 90, 91, 95, 96, 98, 102–106,
204, 219, 220, 222, 228, 239, 246–250 108–110, 116, 129, 155, 163, 209, 213,
of intimacy, 61, 168, 169, 189, 190, 192, 215–223, 228, 229, 238, 239, 243
202, 204, 243 Government, 1, 2, 13, 16, 21, 22, 24,
women’s 39, 41–43, 53, 55, 56, 58, 61, 67, 91,
NIACE, 20, 116, 126 95–97, 102, 103, 105, 106, 108–110,
non-profit organisations, 14 114–116, 119, 121, 122, 126, 127, 131,
centres 135, 141, 147, 150–158, 173, 175, 191,
non-vocational motivation, 209–211, 213, 215–223, 228–230, 239,
240, 246
O postmodern, 7, 212
older, 20, 24, 28, 30, 48, 90, 91, 97, 98, poststructural, 210, 212, 216, 221, 223
101–103, 105, 106, 109, 110, 114, 117, Foucauldian, 7, 169, 210, 216, 220, 221
119, 122, 126, 129, 135, 170, 192, 195, power, 6, 7, 15, 16, 24–26, 28, 30, 38, 41, 44,
203, 227–230, 232 46, 49, 53, 54, 57, 59, 64, 70, 72–74,
women workers, 113, 126, 129 76–78, 80, 81, 85, 114–116, 127, 138,
Open University, 53, 56–58, 60, 118, 173, 145, 151, 168–170, 177, 179, 184, 185,
176 209–211, 213–223, 225, 230, 236, 243,
247–250
P capillary, 210, 220, 221
part-time, 55, 57, 62, 63, 66, 91, 92, 97, 102, pastoral, 211
118, 119, 120, 122, 123, 134, 136, practices of, 2, 39, 44, 184, 210, 211, 215,
138–141, 176, 195, 197, 200, 202, 203, 229
232, 247 relations, 2, 5, 16, 19, 24–26, 28, 30–32,
female learners, 119, 141, 122 38, 40, 41, 43, 44, 46–49, 70, 72, 73,
workers, 20, 23, 24, 41, 57, 90, 97, 98, 76, 78, 80, 81, 85, 90–92, 99, 114–117,
105, 109, 110, 113, 114, 117, 118, 121, 123, 125, 126, 145, 158, 159, 170,
123, 125, 126, 129, 130, 134–138, 174–178, 180, 182, 184, 185, 189,
140–143, 153–155, 168, 173, 247, 249 192–194, 202, 204, 210, 213, 214, 220,
patriarchal, 76, 159, 212, 215, 222 230, 236, 239, 246, 248
pedagogy, 15, 19, 24, 132, 133, 142, 143, 156 sovereign, 211
pedagogies, 6, 13, 15, 53, 85 prior learning, 222
pedagogical, 19, 23, 58, 65, 183, 209, 215 Professional, 3, 4, 15, 20, 22, 23, 55–57,
peer support, 14 60–62, 66, 69, 71, 72, 76–79, 97, 131,
performativity, 4, 182, 183 134, 135, 137–143, 154, 156, 168, 169,
personal and professional development, 15, 173–175, 177–187, 202–204, 233, 243
60, 135, 141 professionalism, 177, 178, 182, 183, 186, 243
PLAR, 222, 223 psycho-social, 19, 26, 27, 31, 32
policy, 1–7, 14, 15, 19–24, 27, 30, 37–45,
48, 49, 55, 58, 66, 91, 92, 95, 97, 103, Q
108–110, 113–116, 126, 127, 129, 131, qualifications, 2, 3, 16, 40, 62, 63, 91, 92,
136, 141, 146, 147, 155, 157–159, 163, 95–99, 102–106, 108, 109, 116–118,
169, 175, 183, 189–191, 193, 194, 199, 129, 130, 134–142, 173, 174, 186, 190,
209, 216, 227, 230, 243, 245–247, 249, 192, 193, 195, 197–201, 203, 204, 233
251
educational, 1, 3, 14, 19, 23, 27, 37–39, R
41–43, 45–47, 49, 51, 53–57, 59–61, race, 2, 7, 8, 15, 27, 28, 30, 37, 38, 42, 56, 90,
63, 65–67, 69, 72, 76–80, 90–92, 91, 117, 124, 127, 138, 163, 167, 168,
113–118, 127, 129, 131, 132, 135, 141, 174, 189, 191, 219, 222, 243, 248
142, 145, 148–151, 153, 158, 168, 169, radical, 8, 20, 24, 26, 29, 39, 54, 116, 117, 212
179, 189–195, 197–199, 202–205, 212, raising aspirations, 43, 44, 49
215, 222, 228, 230, 243, 251 reflective practice, 143, 178, 179, 181
258 Index
reflexivity, 92, 141, 142, 249 agenda, 1–3, 6, 7, 14, 22–24, 43, 58, 87,
research, 1, 3, 4, 7, 8, 13–16, 19, 21, 22, 89, 91, 105, 113–117, 119–127, 163,
24–27, 30, 37, 38, 42, 44, 47, 53–55, 169, 173, 175, 182, 209, 213, 218, 222,
57, 59, 61, 63, 69–77, 79–81, 96, 228–230, 239, 245–248, 250, 251
98–104, 109, 113–116, 118, 119, -based approach, 3, 14
123, 124, 126, 127, 142, 145, 151, deficit, 38, 40, 43, 49, 85, 90, 96, 97, 117,
155–158, 167–170, 173, 175, 176, 190, 191
180, 181, 183, 184, 189–194, 209, 212, employability, 20, 23, 29, 40, 60, 90, 113,
213, 215, 223, 227, 230, 233, 235–239, 117, 118, 122, 130, 153
245, 250 higher level, 55, 92, 108, 114, 129, 137,
action, 3, 4, 7, 13, 15, 19, 23, 24, 26, 29, 139, 176, 178, 197, 203, 204
32, 39, 53, 60, 64, 65, 75, 81, 85, 89, shortage, 53, 55, 90, 96, 110, 150, 157, 158
91, 92, 96, 97, 115, 122, 124, 129, 132, transferable, 123, 126, 243
138, 142, 143, 153, 156, 159, 163, workplace, 2, 3, 6, 15, 16, 28, 29, 32, 60,
177–180, 183, 200, 202, 203, 210, 216, 61, 66, 85, 87, 89–92, 113–127, 129,
218, 246, 248 131–139, 141–144, 153, 167, 168,
biographical approaches, 174–182, 184, 185, 232, 243, 244, 247,
empirical, 8, 13, 27, 71, 77, 90, 167–170, 248
181, 190–192, 194, 204 social, 1–4, 8, 14, 15, 19–22, 24–32, 37–44,
feminist, 3, 5–8, 16, 24, 53, 59, 71, 74, 75, 46, 47, 49, 55, 57, 61, 65–67, 70,
81, 85, 167, 169, 170, 189, 209–223, 71, 73, 76–81, 91, 92, 113–115, 118,
243, 246, 249–251 120–123, 125, 127, 129, 130, 132, 135,
methodological approaches, 7, 89, 163 136, 140, 142, 143, 145–151, 154, 156,
narrative-based research, 157, 167–170, 177, 180, 184, 189–195,
narrative analysis, 14 197, 199–205, 209–215, 219–221, 223,
quantitative methodology, 227–230, 232, 233, 235–239, 243,
standardised biographies, 197, 199, 204 245–251
resistance, 6, 42, 74, 169, 170, 191, 209–211, capital, 2, 23, 28, 38, 44, 115, 117, 137,
213–223, 225, 243, 248, 249 140, 147, 152, 155, 168, 169, 190, 191,
193, 194, 200, 201, 203–205, 250
S change, 6, 8, 19–22, 28, 41, 42, 53–56, 58,
Science, 1, 7, 13–15, 19, 25, 26, 37, 39, 45, 59, 63–66, 74, 78–80, 85, 90, 91, 96,
53–55, 57–59, 62, 69, 71, 74, 85, 89, 98–102, 104–106, 108–110, 113, 116,
95–97, 113, 114, 129, 133, 145, 148, 117, 119, 123, 124, 126, 130, 134, 137,
163, 167, 173, 189, 191, 200, 209, 223, 143, 146–149, 151–153, 155, 157–159,
227, 243, 245, 250 169, 175, 177, 178, 180–185, 192, 197,
Science, Engineering and Technology (SET), 199, 203, 209, 210, 212, 217, 218, 220,
15, 53–67, 85, 90, 163 221, 237, 238, 245, 251
self-esteem, 62, 77, 78, 91, 113, 123, 183, 230 class, 1, 2, 6–8, 13, 19, 20, 27–29, 32,
sexism, 78, 79 37–39, 41–44, 46, 48, 49, 58, 74, 78,
sexual, 1, 25, 28, 37, 38, 42–46, 55, 69–81, 89–91, 105, 114, 115, 118, 119, 121,
142, 202, 218, 236, 239 126, 127, 138, 139, 147, 163, 167–170,
assault, 70, 76, 80, 81 175, 177–179, 181, 189–191, 193–195,
bribery, 70 197, 202–204, 209, 214, 221, 228, 234,
coercion, 69, 70, 81 236, 238, 239, 243, 245–248
harassment, 55, 70–81 cohesion, 2, 229, 239, 250
shared experience, 13, 14, 61, 85, 197, 201 network, 3, 6, 7, 15, 53, 56–62, 64–67,
skills, 2–7, 14, 19–23, 29, 31, 32, 41, 42, 49, 79, 81, 85, 118, 124, 129, 167–170,
53, 57, 58, 60, 62–66, 89–91, 95–97, 189–195, 197–205, 211, 217, 227, 230,
99, 102–105, 108, 110, 114–124, 126, 233, 237–239, 243, 248, 250
127, 130–133, 135, 137, 141–143, 150, network analysis, 189, 190
152–156, 163, 174, 176, 178, 180–182, networks, 3, 6, 61, 62, 65–67, 81, 85, 124,
184, 190, 200, 212–215, 217, 221, 222, 129, 167–169, 189, 190, 192–194, 198,
227, 231–235, 243, 246–248, 250 202, 204, 205, 239, 243, 248, 250
Index 259
solidarity, 6, 75, 76, 79, 81, 85, 193, 248 61, 63, 65, 69, 71, 77, 81, 86, 87,
subversion, 214, 217–219, 221 89–92, 95, 96, 99, 102, 103, 105, 108,
113–127, 129, 131–139, 141–145, 147,
T 154, 159, 163, 167–170, 173–185, 189,
technology, 15, 41, 53, 56–58, 85, 96, 135, 193, 199, 200, 204, 209–223, 227–241,
153, 154, 212, 215–217, 219, 220, 238, 243–251
246, 247 vocational education and training, 2, 154,
women in, 7, 20, 53–59, 61, 62, 65–67, 70, 168, 243
72–76, 78–81, 85, 90–92, 98, 104, 123, volunteers, 213, 230, 231
127, 136, 138–141, 145–153, 155–157, volunteering, 230
159, 161, 163, 168, 170, 202, 209, voluntary and community sector organisations,
212–219, 221, 222, 227, 228, 231–234, 3
237, 239, 247–249
technologies, 15, 41, 49, 57, 58, 89, 211, 214, W
217–219, 221 widening participation, 2, 3, 8, 13, 14, 37,
technologies of power, 211, 214, 218, 219, 39–41, 43, 47, 49, 91, 129–131, 134,
221 136, 141, 174, 191, 239, 246, 247, 250
Take Back the Night, 217 policy, 43, 141, 247
Trade Union, 24, 113–117, 124, 127 woman-centred, 6, 236
activity, 31, 57, 59–61, 65, 66, 70, 92, 114, Women in Lifelong Learning Network, 7
117, 124, 132, 152, 153 Women into Science and Engineering (WISE),
transformation, 6, 15, 24, 41, 80, 132, 157, 59
184, 247 women only, 228, 248, 249
training, 2, 14, 15, 20–23, 53, 55, 57, 58, 60, learning environments, 90, 228, 240
61, 63, 65, 66, 85, 90, 95–99, 102–106, spaces, 3, 5, 42, 80, 168–170, 182, 193,
108, 109, 113, 116, 117, 120, 125, 133, 209, 220, 222, 223, 235–239, 243–246,
137, 140, 141, 143, 145, 151–155, 157, 248, 249, 251
158, 168, 169, 175, 176, 182, 189, 191, women’s,
192, 198, 199, 201, 203, 204, 209, 211, careers, 16, 45, 47, 54–56, 59, 60, 63, 65,
213, 216, 221, 222, 232, 234, 243, 246 66, 77–79, 85, 90, 99, 100, 102, 108,
transitions, 102, 153, 168, 173, 175, 177, 179, 124, 163, 191, 193, 198–200, 202, 203,
181, 183, 185, 187, 189–192, 198, 199 222, 232, 245
employment, 2, 5, 7, 20, 23, 53–55, 57–66,
U 89–92, 95–97, 99, 104–106, 109, 110,
Universities’ Association for Lifelong 114, 116, 125, 130, 131, 135–141,
Learning, 7 145–147, 150–159, 163, 167, 169, 174,
UK government workplace learning agenda, 193–195, 197–200, 202–204, 211, 213,
114 214, 220–222, 229, 232, 245, 247
UK Resource Centre for Women in SET Institutes, 62, 148, 149, 167, 170, 227,
(UKRC), 55, 56, 59 228, 236, 238
Union learning representatives, 124 underrepresentation, 16, 163
UNISON, 113–115, 118–125, 127, 163 work, 1–3, 5–8, 13–16, 20, 23, 24, 26–32,
38, 39, 41–44, 46–48, 53–67, 70–72,
V 74, 78–81, 85, 87, 89–92, 95–111,
violence against women, 69, 70, 72, 73, 76, 113–127, 129–144, 146–159, 163,
79–81 167–170, 173–186, 189–195, 197–205,
virtual environment, 13 209–213, 215–220, 222, 223, 227,
vocational, 2, 4, 5, 22, 91, 99, 102, 103, 105, 229–233, 236–239, 243–251
106, 108, 114, 117, 122, 126, 127, 129, life balance, 61, 97
134–137, 151, 153–156, 167–169, 174, related benefits, 114, 125
190, 197–199, 204, 229, 240, 243 return to work, 53, 56, 58, 62, 63, 65
learning, 1–8, 11, 13–16, 19–27, 29–33, workplace learning provision
35, 37, 38, 40–42, 49, 53, 57, 58, 60,